Interactive Forum December 2017: Cici Bellis Serve

[don_budge]

Yeah and Federer was a soccer player...

I throw right handed and play tennis left handed. When I began playing tennis at 14 I had been playing baseball and basketball for years...right handed. At first I was switching the racquet from my left hand to my right hand to hit only forehands. But when my coach went to show me how to serve for some reason I wanted to serve left handed. Trust me...I had (have for my age) a great serve. But I cannot really throw left handed. I suppose if I practiced I could. Conversely I was a pretty darned good pitcher and played all of the positions in baseball. A lot of catching...the catcher. But I cannot serve right handed...although if I practiced I probably could.

Obviously there are some similarities in the motion, but to learn a good service motion one is not dependent upon the other. Not necessarily.

[vanderhaygm]

Player who made a major change

I had one player who listened to me and did the work I asked him to do. Greg was going into his senior year of high school and was already a tournament player albeit not a very good one. He had the problem with the dropped elbow on the backswing that comes partly from trying to get into the "backscratch" early in his development. It's very hard to correct and is part of Cici's problem.

I told Greg that he was going to have to hit 100 to 150 baskets of serves with deliberate practice to have a chance to correct this. Not only did he hit those serves, he used the "Hiccup Drill" to help to correct the faulty position. What you want is a straight line from left shoulder to right elbow in the trophy position before you drop the racket and really start to go up. This showed up really well in the video of Rafa working with Oscar Boras in the summer before he won his first US Open.

Anyway, Greg did the work and even used the Hiccup Drill in match play for a couple of months to change the habit and he was able to make the change. The later video shows he still needed a lot more Internal Shoulder Rotation (maybe another 90 degrees of racket face rotation), but he had no chance of ever develping that out of the previous position.

Comparison video of Greg

https://youtu.be/MvWCc4dQN9k

The Stances for these drills and the "Hiccup"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2NCiPeTzdw4

The Oscar Boras and Rafael Nadal serve lesson. I've forgotten the name of Magicone who is doing the narration.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyNEC3gXHL8

don

That's very impressive. Great work

[arturohernandez]

It would be interesting to see if there Is a way to formulate subject demographic information of prior throwing experience. My intuitive observations over the years seemed to sense a correlation between similar sport throwing experience like baseball throw or volleyball serve and the tennis serve. But, current research for a correlation is mixed.

I agree. I think that learning to throw and specifically the motion to create a spiral on an American football is the key. Volleyball is also interesting if we think of the spike motion and the serve motion.

All of these are easier because there is no racket.

Then we simply add a racket but the throw motion is already there and can be readily incorporated.

[johnyandell]

Yeah and Federer was a soccer player...

[doctorhl]

It would be interesting to see if there Is a way to formulate subject demographic information of prior throwing experience. My intuitive observations over the years seemed to sense a correlation between similar sport throwing experience like baseball throw or volleyball serve and the tennis serve. But, current research for a correlation is mixed.

[doctorhl]

Thanks for taking the time to post this...interesting.

I am doing a simple study at the moment involving 200 children of mixed gender and ages. All the children have to throw a tennis ball as far as they can. I have only recorded the throws of 32 children so far but already there is a significant difference between the boys and the girls. The girls are mostly very weak at throwing and cannot throw a ball nearly as far as the boys. In another few weeks I hope to have recorded the throws of all 200 children.

[arturohernandez]

I agree that there are women who can use their serve as a weapon. But it seems to be a tradeoff to a greater extent for women. Few can have big serves and move well. It seems either/or. For men there seems to be a sweet spot just around 6' to 6'3" where men can have a big serve and still move well.

Raonic has a bigger serve than Federer but Fed can still hit plenty big so that it is not a weakness.

Women who serve big end up being taller but less mobile. So the upside of the serve is not big enough to compensate for the need for movement.

Does this make sense?

[rwiener]

Two thoughts:

1) I was watching the Fed-Zverev replay from the Hopman Cup last night and heard a bit of commentary about Zverev's second serve. The commentator was noting that for 6-6 Zverev's second serve should help him setup the point so that he could attack the return. Then he said that his groundstrokes were so good that it made up for it.

I suspect that this happens with girls. The serve doesn't matter so much at a young age so why worry about it. A poor serve is likely to not hold them back as much.

It seems to me that in the old days a lot of women just used their serve as a set-up shot. I’m thinking Chris Evert as the paradigm but one could put a lot of great champions (e.g. Seles, etc) in this category. Maybe the difference between the current game and the old days is that there now are some players such as Williams and some others who actually use their service as a weapon. Didn’t used to be that way in the women’s game.

[johnyandell]

Stotty,
If you video some of this it would make a fascinating article.

[stotty]

Hi Stotty, So just to confirm. They stand on the baseline and throw the ball in a straight line (i.e. NOT diagonally, like they would in a regular serve) as far as they can. I am going to use video to capture the landing point. My guess is that you have most of the court measured out so I should be able to just measure from some fixed point on the court and give that to you. Do you have the court all measured out?

Yes in starlight line from the baseline. I did have areas roughly marked using boundaries. I have since decided this too vague and started afresh and now use a long measuring tape to measure each and every throw accurately.

Would you accept a child that is 35 years old, 6ft 6in. tall from Florida? LOL.
Good luck with the study stotty. Interested to hear about the results.

Kyle LaCroix USPTA
Boca Raton

Okay you can join in but you have to throw with your left arm while lying down flat on your back with the wind against you....

[arturohernandez]

Of course, add them both in. Players must stand on the baseline and throw down the court as far as they can. They get three attempts with the furtherest throw recorded. Throws must be from a standing position with no run up permitted. The goal is to throw beyond the opposite baseline. Your boy would be a candidate to achieve that with that fast arm of his, but you would be surprised how many can't. Measurements are in metres if possible.

I am aiming 200 junior tennis throwers as a minimum so it would be great to have your two onboard.

Hi Stotty, So just to confirm. They stand on the baseline and throw the ball in a straight line (i.e. NOT diagonally, like they would in a regular serve) as far as they can. I am going to use video to capture the landing point. My guess is that you have most of the court measured out so I should be able to just measure from some fixed point on the court and give that to you. Do you have the court all measured out?

[klacr]

Thanks for taking the time to post this...interesting.

I am doing a simple study at the moment involving 200 children of mixed gender and ages. All the children have to throw a tennis ball as far as they can. I have only recorded the throws of 32 children so far but already there is a significant difference between the boys and the girls. The girls are mostly very weak at throwing and cannot throw a ball nearly as far as the boys. In another few weeks I hope to have recorded the throws of all 200 children.

Would you accept a child that is 35 years old, 6ft 6in. tall from Florida? LOL.
Good luck with the study stotty. Interested to hear about the results.

Kyle LaCroix USPTA
Boca Raton

[stotty]

Can I add my daughter to the mix? If so, just tell me how to set it up and I can try it.

My son is 18, so I assume that he is out of the age range you are looking for.

Of course, add them both in. Players must stand on the baseline and throw down the court as far as they can. They get three attempts with the furtherest throw recorded. Throws must be from a standing position with no run up permitted. The goal is to throw beyond the opposite baseline. Your boy would be a candidate to achieve that with that fast arm of his, but you would be surprised how many can't. Measurements are in metres if possible.

I am aiming 200 junior tennis throwers as a minimum so it would be great to have your two onboard.

[arturohernandez]

It isn't a big deal but everyone around her will make it a big deal. She's a tennis player at a very high level. What is so difficult in teaching a proper serve motion to a player of that caliber? We all teach lesser players this motion all the time. One of the big questions is about Cici. What about her attitude? It's a question of attitude first. Secondly...what about her coach? Why hasn't this been a priority?

Modern tennis is a bit whack these days. Modern women's tennis is really lacking in direction it seems to me although to be honest I have very little/no interest. Even though, as Ed Atkinson says, it's the same game but different clothes. I guess it is fair to say that very soon I will have very little/no interest in the men's game either barring some kind of miracle.

Interesting about McNamee...I never heard that about his backhand.

Two thoughts:

1) I was watching the Fed-Zverev replay from the Hopman Cup last night and heard a bit of commentary about Zverev's second serve. The commentator was noting that for 6-6 Zverev's second serve should help him setup the point so that he could attack the return. Then he said that his groundstrokes were so good that it made up for it.

I suspect that this happens with girls. The serve doesn't matter so much at a young age so why worry about it. A poor serve is likely to not hold them back as much.

2) Interesting that the most significant difference between good and great servers is shoulder over shoulder rotation.

At the same time it states that this part of the serve doesn't develop until later as the girls get older.

So there must be a crucial time to teach this and it may be a bit later in development than with boys do to strength.

Again, it must be part of the developmental progression and it might be that girls may need more time to get strong enough for shoulder to shoulder to matter.

Is there nothing on this from any of the junior development programs (i.e. ITF, USTA, LTA, Australian Tennis, etc.)?

[arturohernandez]

Thanks for taking the time to post this...interesting.

I am doing a simple study at the moment involving 200 children of mixed gender and ages. All the children have to throw a tennis ball as far as they can. I have only recorded the throws of 32 children so far but already there is a significant difference between the boys and the girls. The girls are mostly very weak at throwing and cannot throw a ball nearly as far as the boys. In another few weeks I hope to have recorded the throws of all 200 children.

Can I add my daughter to the mix? If so, just tell me how to set it up and I can try it.

My son is 18, so I assume that he is out of the age range you are looking for.