Federer's Serve - Difficult To Read

Listen to what Janko Tipsarevic said after losing a classic tennis match to Roger Federer the other night -- "I couldn't read his serve".

In all of tennis instruction, shot disguise is the least discussed part of tennis technique.

What is disguise as it applies to tennis shots?

Basically, a shot is well disguised if the receiver doesn't pick up any cues early on that will tip the receiver as to where the ball is going.

Cues that tip off the direction of the shot include the setup of the feet, the position of the shoulders, the timing of the rotation, and different locations for the service toss.

The great servers toss the ball in the same location for all the different serves. Less skillful servers tip off what type of serve is going to be hit by the toss. The toss may be to the left and over the head for a kick serve, to the right for a slice serve, and in betweeen for a flat serve.

There's a story floating around as to how Pete Sampras used to practice as he was developing his serve.

Pete would toss the ball to the same location each time without knowing where he was going to hit the ball. At the last second, his coach would yell out where the serve was supposed to go and Pete would make a last millisecond adjustment of his hand to change the direction of the ball.

From a returner's point of view, it is very frustrating to play a player with great disguise on the serve. You have to wait until after the ball is hit to know where it's going and that's usually too late if the serve is well placed.

That's probably why Andy Rodick's serve at 140 mph seems to be less effective than Federer's serve at 120. Roddick probably cues the direction where Federer doesn't.

As you try to work on your game try to swing the same way for different shots and change the direction of the ball by slighty varying the contact point.

Ask your practice partners if they can tell where your shots are going and when they can tell. If your partners can read where your shots are going before the ball is actually hit, then you are probably giving something away.

So, the moral of the story is to keep working on that disguise.

Until next time,

Glenn Sheiner M.D. - author of Insider Tennis Strategies Insider Tennis Tactics To Win More Matches guaranteed to make you a smarter tennis player and take your tennis to the next level. Also, check out the world's top tennis humor screensaver
Tennis Cartoon Screensaver. You can download a trial version for FREE.

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Tennis -- Australian Open Time

It's time for the 2008 Australian Open Tennis Championships.

What this means is that serious tennis is about to start for 2008. After all, if Roger Federer can continue to play otherwordly tennis at the Australian Open, he can climb a little closer to the all-time record of 14 slams held by Pete Sampras.

This year's tourney will feature a new court surface. For the past 20 years the tennis at the Aussie Open has been played on a surface called Rebound Ace.

Rebound Ace has not been a popular surface for a number of reasons. First of all, players have complained that the surface gets sticky when it gets hot (and it gets very hot at the Australian Tennis Open Championships) and players say that there is a real risk of suffering ankle sprains on the synthetic surface.

Secondly, the top Australian Tennis player Lleyton Hewitt has complained bitterly over the years that Rebound Ace is too slow and doesn't give him a good chance to compete for the championship. Note that the concept of a national tennis organization trying to use a surface to favor homegrown players isn't so foreign. It's commonly believed that the US Open surface is kept very fast to favor hard-hitting Americans who grew up on the fast hard courts of California and Florida.

So, this year a faster synthetic surface called Plexicushion is being rolled out.
If you're watching the tennis at the Australian Open on TV this year, the most obvious change that you'll notice is the color of the new Plexicushion surface.

So, the let the games begin and let's see what the tennis looks like.

Until next time,

Glenn Sheiner M.D. - author of Insider Tennis Strategies Change Your Tennis Tactics To Win More Matches guaranteed to make you a smarter tennis player and take your tennis to the next level. Also, check out the world's top tennis humor screensaver
Tennis Cartoon Screensaver. You can download a trial version for FREE.

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Tennis Footwork, Speed and Movement

Speed, quickness, and overall movement skills on the tennis court are killer weapons.

Everybody knows that being in good shape is important in tennis but great tennis movement and overall tennis court quickness changes the game in other subtle ways.

I just played a sanctioned tournament in my age group. Won my first round 6-0, 6-3 against a good player. Then had to go against the #1 seed in the next round.

I asked around and found out that he was a very solid player in superb condition. What they didn't say was that he moved like a cat on the tennis court. He had great tennis quickness, movement, footwork, and balance. He utilized the split step technique well but had sprinter's speed when he was pulled wide or short.

I can't tell you how this changed the game.

I probably had about 10 -15 points in the match where I played a great point and hit the ball into a position that most players wouldn't reach, let alone return with a good defensive shot.

It became almost impossible for me to finish this guy off in a point. Eventually , I subconsciously starting going for too much which is rarely a good strategy.

At the end of the match we had a chance to chat. I asked him what he thought of my game and where he would tell me to improve.

He told me my serve was excellent and my strokes were fine. But, then he said I should work on quickness. He told me about his tennis quickness and movement training routine.

At the top levels of tennis you have to deal with two great skill sets --three actually.

The top players usually are great technically with their strokes, great athletes with great court coverage, quickness, speed, and balance on the tennis court, and strong tactically.

If you're only strong in 1 or 2 of these areas you may struggle when you play the #1 guy or gal in the country.

Next time we'll talk about training routines.

Until next time,

Glenn Sheiner M.D. - author of Insider Tennis Strategies Change Your Tennis Tactics To Win More Matches guaranteed to make you a smarter tennis player and take your tennis to the next level. Also, check out the world's top tennis humor screensaver
Tennis Cartoon Screensaver. You can download a trial version for FREE.

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