A New Teaching System: The Serve: Toss

[johnyandell]

Would love to get your thoughts on "A New Teaching System: The Serve: Toss"

[tennis_chiro]

You left out the rhythm of the rock!

Would love to get your thoughts on "A New Teaching System: The Serve: Toss"

John, I thought this was a great piece on the actual mechanics of the arm motion in the service toss. However, I feel strongly that you have left out a critical element in developing a consistent and reliable toss. It is an element that is often taken for granted or completely overlooked and clearly lacking in many of the serves of world class players. Those players usually have grave problems with the consistency of their serves.

That vital element of the tossing action is the integral relationship between the rock or transfer of the weight from back to front and the actual toss of the ball. You can rock from back to front like Sampras or you can rock from front to back to front like Stich or Krajicek or you can even rock like many of today's players with an intial motion to the rear before the real rock forward starts synchronized with the movement of the hands and arms, but there is a real rhythm to that movement or rock and it absolutely must be interlocked with the toss of the ball. When the movement of the arm in the toss is divorced from this rock of the weight, the toss will never be consistent under pressure and the serve will break down. I prefer to connect the rhythm of that rock to the gravity swing of the racket in the backswing, but the many good servers and consistent servers that do not do that show that it is not necessary. Andy Roddick's motion is very complicated and not recommended as one to duplicate; the rhythm is very hard to copy; but it is absolutely the same every time he tosses the ball up and his service percentage was accordingly quite high in spite of the higher speed of his serve and the complexity of his motion.

For me the rhythm of the rock is the lynchpin that holds the serve together. You can find many different rhythms and you will even find a number of tossing actions that break many of the "rules" (maybe I should call them suggestions) that JY is putting forward here (and I would certainly second almost all of them as well). Talented athletes can find all kinds of ways to improvise and "break the rules". But for most of us, we need to do things in the simplest and most biomechanically efficient way to develop any kind of reliable proficiency.

You will find some very good and effective servers that break some of these rules, but I challenge you to find any good servers with reasonable first serve percentages (who actually win the majority of their first serve points) and low numbers of double faults (with a reasonable percentage of points won on second serve) for whom it is not clear that the rhythm of the weight transfer or "the rock" is inexorably linked to the action of their toss. On the other hand, you will find many with apparently good motions and seemingly inexplicable lack of consistency and accuracy with their serves who are clearly lacking this critical element to their serves.

I've been preaching this dictum for a long time against an endless quest for more and more power. JY's series on the serve is great and the fact that an entire article is dedicated to the toss is a step in the right direction. But if you leave out this element of synchronization of the rhythm of the rock with the rhythm of the toss, you will not develop a consistent serve. If you can't reliably put the serve where you want it with a high level of consistency under pressure, it doesn't matter how high the speed gun reads. A 140 mph fault is no better than an 80 mph fault. And these days, an 80 mph second serve simply won't cut it. To be able to hit those 95 mph and up second serves under pressure, you better have a great link between the rhythm of your "rock" and the action of your service toss or it's game, set and match for your opponent. At the recreational level, we can probably cut 20 to 30 mph off those numbers, but for the 3.5 club player trying to get his 60 mph second serve into the box, if he doesn't have rhythm, he's up that proverbial creek without a paddle and it's just as big a problem for him at 50 to 60 mph as it is for the pro at 85 to 95 mph.

Practice and develop the technique JY is so beautifully illustrating here, but learn to link up the rhythm of your tossing action to the rhythm of your "rock".

don

[johnyandell]

This is of the best things about Tennisplayer. The opportunity to hear multiple views, especially from people with Don's cred.

I was already planning an article on the series on rhythm but mainly to do with toss height and backswing shape and timing. I am going to try to wrap my mind around what Don says and maybe steal something for the serve series.

[tennis_chiro]

Let's hear from of the rest of you out there!

This is of the best things about Tennisplayer. The opportunity to hear multiple views, especially from people with Don's cred.

I was already planning an article on the series on rhythm but mainly to do with toss height and backswing shape and timing. I am going to try to wrap my mind around what Don says and maybe steal something for the serve series.

I'm really glad to hear JY is going to try to incorporate some part of this concept into his serve series. I'm really looking forward to reading that article. It's not a concept that lends itself to simple video breakdown. It's not just the toss. It's not just the rhythm of the rock. It is the interrelatedness of the two actions that holds everything together. When you learn to dance, you think about the steps and sometimes they can be somewhat complex. But once you learn the steps, you don't think about where you put your feet; you just feel the beat of the music. Golfers tend to understand rhythm a little better than tennis players. They refer to the tempo, or the time from takeaway to contact; they know that has to be absolutely consistent on every shot from wedge to driver. In the same way, a tennis player's toss on his serve should have an absolutely consistent rhythm, or in the golfer's parlance, tempo.

I was really hoping for more input from some of the rest of you, either supporting or disagreeing with what I have put forth.

don

[don_budge]

From the rest of me...

Golfers tend to understand rhythm a little better than tennis players. They refer to the tempo, or the time from takeaway to contact; they know that has to be absolutely consistent on every shot from wedge to driver. In the same way, a tennis player's toss on his serve should have an absolutely consistent rhythm, or in the golfer's parlance, tempo.

don

Here's a great thread where you and I were dueling banjo's playing on the chords of "timing" and the like.

http://www.tennisplayer.net/bulletin/showthread.php?t=1878&highlight=wrist+snaps&page=4

The quote below was from that thread...

So there is always one more thing. After the student has mastered his "figure eights" and developed a gravity based and frictionless swing and the wrist is behaving itself...the whole thing is dependent on one more thing. Putting the ball in the path of the traveling racquet head. This can be very disruptive to the whole process.

There is basically one point in time and space where it all collides simultaneously, and perfectly...where the grip, the motion and all of the generated energy meet the ball. Any deviation from this one point in time and space will produce less than "perfect" shots as energy and potential energy will be wasted or erratic.

I call this point "it". Musicians get it...the whole craft depends upon it. Golfers get it. Tennis players get it. Great oraters get it. Anybody who successfully and repeatedly is accomplished in anything in any walk of life gets it. It's too bad more people don't get it...have you ever known anybody who just doesn't get it. But...it is not so easy as that when you are trying to deliver the ball to that one point in time and space in order to put the ball right where the ball should be, and when the ball should be there. When and where...time and space.

As tennis players, this in the end, is the object of our craft also...we seek to find that one point in time and space where everything is perfect. This relates to our serves, our groundstrokes, to those of us hitting the ball in the air still it relates to our volleys. It relates to every single type of shot under the sun. The quest as it were, is to get the grip right, get the feet, body and racquet into position, and then move all the responsible parts to get the racquet head to meet the ball the way we intend it to when we attempt any particular shot. The ultimate challenge for a human being is to have that kind of control over ones self to master such an endeavor. This is why golf and tennis are God's gift to humanity in terms of at recreation...possibly even more significant than that. There are physics, in a "perfect" world and there are the metaphysics in the real world as we know it. Rod Cross is great but he has left a huge variable out of the equation while focusing on some others. But don't get me wrong, he is fine in a certain sphere of influence, I think.

Perhaps a new thread...and a couple of more videos from Coach Don on the toss...in order to assist the student to find "it". Excellent job, Coach...btw.

As always there is much wisdom and attention to detail in what you say. In fact...I believe that you are alluding to "It". That one point in time and space where everything comes together perfectly and the energy is transferred perfectly through the conduit into the object of your desire. That almost sounds like sex. Hmmm...

But at any rate your points that you make alluding to golfism's are not lost on me. I have in the past compared the tennis serve to an upside down golf swing among other things. It is a most difficult process to describe...but then again so is love. Maybe serving is like sex after all...golf and sex. It is a very sexy motion when done perfectly...isn't it?

How does one tee that ball up at that one point and time and space and arrive at it with all of your might? Well for one thing...it must be done as effortlessly as possible. We talked a bit about gravity being the perfect force to try and tie yourself into and that certainly helps when you talk about "rhythm" or "tempo". How to duplicate the same speed consistently under any and all conditions...that is the challenge in putting that little orb into space. It is funny that now when I am serving after taking so many years off from competition that I can still manage it fairly well.

My thoughts are pretty simple to begin with...to get too complicated is to get in your own way. I start with the point where I want to meet the ball with my racquet and sort of zone in on this point. Since I am pretty limited these days in my repertoire of serves I am only aiming for basically one spot...I might change that spot a little depending on what kind of spin or how much. The other thought that I try to manage...I limit myself to two due to the capacity of my brain...is that I try to feel the racquet falling behind me at the apex of my backswing and that is my signal to gradually step on the gas and accelerate the motion. Nice and smooth with as little effort as possible.

Coordination of those two things sound an awful lot about what you are referring to tennis_chiro...the synchronization of movement and ball. It is such a great point to make as johnyandell acknowledges. It is a whole story in itself...but it is perhaps too complicated for the ordinary tennis student. When I first started golfing I would try to get out with the best golfers that I could get to go with me. Being a bit of a Richard Gonzales myself...watching like a cat in my mind's eye...I studied the motion of their swings in as disinterested mode as possible. That is...without too much emphasis on their actual or individual technique. I was passively trying to absorb through osmosis the tempo and the rhythm of their motions. People have always complimented me on my tempo and like you mention...if you have the perfect tempo you can hold onto that tempo no matter what club you are using or what shot you are attempting...from the putter to the driver. Tempo is so important in the shortest of motions as well.

Your comments are the most astute of all and they cause me to lapse into eons of thoughts in the infinite...this idea of "It" is perhaps one of the most compelling concepts known to man. The implications are infinite...there is only one point in time and space where everything is perfect. Just think about it. It is sort of scary when you look around and see some of the bad service motions and golf swings. It makes you wonder where else are we lacking in our perfection of ourselves.

The most perfect serving motion that I have ever personally witnessed was that of J. Donald Budge himself. The timing of his toss and his swing were as if Bobby Jones was playing tennis.

[stotty]

Toss, rock and weight transfer.

The ball toss and how the serve is initiated has fascinated me since working with tennis_chiro and don_budge on the forum. The ball toss and weight transfer are often closely linked in the best serves.

I love John’s article. It’s darn good. It covers everything needed to have an effective serve. But tennis_chiro also raises an excellent point. A point that’s well worth expanding on.

Weight transfer, rhythm and fluidity. The best serves have these components, and best chance of achieving them are at the start of the motion. How the serve is initiated is not considered a “checkpoint” and so is often overlooked. Or at least it is in my neck of the woods.

All players transfer weight differently. Michael Stich and Richard Krajicek had exemplary weight transfer relative to their style of serving. Most top players achieve the same in one way or another. Federer hangs his arms then picks up off a tiny fraction of momentum. McEnroe had the most exaggerated rock back imaginable. Nastase sloped all his weight on his back foot and had a lovely way of rocking the racket to commence the action and propel his weight forward. But then there are top players whose transfer is less than ideal. Kohlschreiber’s is odd. In preparation he rests the ball on the head of the frame. Strange. In doing so he places his arms unnaturally far apart. Effective weight transfer looks tricky before the serve begins. He gets some transfer but it’s far from smooth or ideal. If a server doesn’t maximise weight transfer, he’s going to be muscling the serve down instead. That’s not nearly so good as a “smooth sequence of events” that good weight transfer helps produce

Then there is Gasquet..what kind of transfer is that? Is there any? Okay, some top players get to break the rules...but that’s not to say ALL the rule-breakers get away with it without a price...the price of rhythm and flow.

Developing a Micael Stich-type ball toss, rock and transfer is not easy. Getting the racket to fall weightlessly so it drops under it’s own gravity and without drag takes practice. It has to be rehearsed many times over without a ball. Students must have patience. I find it must be taught early. Once the arms have synched the wrong way for a number of years, and the toss-rock-and-weight transfer have become convoluted, it’s hard to reverse things. The student’s often stuck with it.

Over here, weight transfer took a back seat in coaching when Becker came along with his deep knee-bend. Many coaches focused of knee-bending as the main driver for power. That’s the problem with coaches, we become over focused with the latest observations. Then along came Stich to give Becker (and the coaching world) a serving lesson in the 1991 Wimbledon final. He blew Becker away...out served him completely.

The ball toss, rock and weight transfer are inextricably linked...at least for me they are. All players have their way of transferring weight, I guess, but it’s hard to beat Stich’s method. That boy was as thin as a rake but could serve at 130mph, effortlessly, all day long. It’s all about rhythm, rhythm, rhythm.

When I watch any player serve I always look at their weight transfer. On all levels, some players transfer better than others. I find it important. There’s at lot of rhythm and power lost with poor weight transfer. It’s the very first thing I start looking at when I observe a new serve.

[10splayer]

I'm just glad someone is emphasizing a more arching, "left toss". There are too many pros teaching players to keep the tossing arm in "front" and toss straight up. Too me, this gets down to sequencing, or how one begins the motion. Does a player toss with the arm in front (see Soderling as an example) and then coil, or do they begin to coil and then release with the arm parallel to the baseline. (well into the coiling phase)

The latter is a much better model.


As someone who tends to teach the second serve first, the "left" ball position, promotes a better "chest up" torso angle in the forward rotational cycle. Those that toss the ball out to the right or straight up (in large part because the arm is held in front) tend to rotate too vertically. (see Soderling)

Also, if one tries to toss, and then coil, loading tends to be compromised or rushed...In the video of Robin, notice how at the release point, the body has not turned away at all. In fact, the shoulders have actually opened up. Contrast that, with the likes of Sampras, or Fed or anyone else for that matter, who are well into the backward rotational cycle at the release point.

The Soderling example is what I see with most club players, who, think the tossing arm should be left in front with a linear toss path.

[johnyandell]

10sPlayer,

Well said.

[pauldupont]

After viewing this I'm off to the practice court!

By the way, your site content is absolutely incredibly relevant, useful, in-depth and for me the ultimate tennis reference!

[DougEng]

10sPlayer,

Well said.

Great article. Of course, I teach the arc toss (release is a better word) too and years ago did it but was told it was incorrect. There are relatively straight tosses too but are much rarer: Hingis, Krajicek. I have the quantitative data on the toss (a project) but we have not finished it. A bit tedious and still missing data.

I don't think the rocking motion and toss synchronity is as important as some suggest. It's not a constant but will vary from player to player. For example, Roddick, (old) Nadal, Henin, Monfils don't use weight transfer front to back. It probably has some importance in the foot back - up (or pinpoint stance) or dependent on the rhythm of the swing (e.g, staggered) but varying importance with different serving styles. Nonetheless it is worth looking at with some serves but I think it's a good analysis question.

[jeffreycounts]

...I was really hoping for more input from some of the rest of you, either supporting or disagreeing with what I have put forth.

don

Don - I find your idea extremely intriguing. The idea that the toss is actually integrated within a rocking motion makes a lot of sense to me. Rather than tossing from a "cold start", the rocking context provides a rhythmic flow of energy for the subsequent toss.

It made me think about how we teach kids the toss from a complete stand still and the results are usually terrible.

Jeff

[tennis_chiro]

It's always tough....

Don - I find your idea extremely intriguing. The idea that the toss is actually integrated within a rocking motion makes a lot of sense to me. Rather than tossing from a "cold start", the rocking context provides a rhythmic flow of energy for the subsequent toss.

It made me think about how we teach kids the toss from a complete stand still and the results are usually terrible.

Jeff

Yes, it's always tough to learn the toss, especially for younger kids, but also adults. I don't start from a complete standstill. I introduce the toss before we even start to hit the ball. And I start with the ball in the hand while they learn the rocking motion. The first think I have them do is ignore the arms (motionless) and simply follow me in the rock back and forth. Normally, I start everyone out with a Sampras-like back to front, but I have them do it forwards and backwards to emphasize the rhythm. I think you can see some of those videos on my youtube website, GlobalTennisDC. You can also find some of my clips at

http://silviahosokawa.smugmug.com/Sports/Don-Brosseau-tennis

My argument is that if I can't get someone to make a simple toss and catch motion back and forth repeatedly without worrying about actually hitting the ball, but really feeling the rhythm of the action, then I can't expect them to find that rhythm when they get just one shot at it back to front in their service motion with the additional stress of having to coordinate the hitting action.

So I ask the student to practice the toss and catch motion in rhythm back and forth for 3-5 minutes 10 times before the next lesson. Not once for 30 minutes, but repeatedly for just a couple of minutes. Then, once they have done that and unfortunately they rarely complete their "homework", then we start to integrate actually hitting the ball. And even if I have them doing a step-broken-down-action (1-racket to trophy, 2-toss, 3-drop racket head and hit), I make them do that with a rhythm, for example my "hiccup".

I prefer the front-to-back-to-front rhythm of Stich, but I won't start someone out that way unless they do it on their own or I have really big plans for them.

The big key is not that it is front to back to front or back to front, but that their is an integral relationship between that weight transfer/rock and the actual tossing of the ball. With the current move toward more platform stances and increased weight kept back on the rear foot later in the action, some players have actually divorced the rock from the toss and I think the drop in service consistency corresponds with that.

I just think the "rock" is the lynchpin that holds everything together like the beat of the music when you dance.

Hoping to hear more comments

don

PS: I just checked the videos on GlobalTennisDC and the silviahosokawa site and I don't have any clips that actually demonstrate the simple back to front rock. Everything I have up is front-to-back-to-front. I'll have to correct that. It's just that when you toss the ball in that rhythm, the weight goes forward; then for the toss-and-catch drill, your weight goes back as you rewind the motion like you are rewinding a movie. The figure 8's get complicated when you try to string them together with the simple back to front weight transfer. You have to add a little motion to get you back to the beginning of the motion to start over.

[bman]

I have always found that, for me personally and some of my students, it is easier to get an accurate toss if I place the arm straight out front and then coil after release. I have always wondered why this has been considered such a no-no.

[msmith33]

John:

Your new teaching system on the serve is terrific. Every time I’ve watched one, I can’t wait for the next one. Keep up the good work.

[stanwerlin]

Really enjoying the “New teaching System” videos on the serve – great work! Also the 2 part Rick Macci videos on the ATP forehand – excellent. My serve and FH will improve thanks to tennisplayer.net