BEGINNER

OBJECTIVE 1: Develop a consistent motion
The most important thing to focus on at this level— whether it’s the first or second serve—is consistency with your delivery, and that begins with the ball toss. It’s normal to tighten up a little on your second serve, so it’s vital, if you want to use that stroke effectively, to take as many variables as possible out of the equation and let repetition and habit take over. The best way to do this is to have a consistent ball toss that doesn’t fl y all over the place and force you to make technical changes in order to hit the ball. Practice by holding the ball in your fingertips and using a lifting, not throwing, motion to place the ball to the right (assuming you’re a right-hander) and in front of your body just above the height of your outstretched racquet. Also, remember to extend your arm fully for your second serve just as you would for your first. Many players unintentionally lower their toss on their second delivery because they get tense.

OBJECTIVE 2: Bridge the gap
At the club level, it’s common to see players hit big, flat first serves that rarely go in, and then follow them up with weak second serves that travel at less than half the speed of their first. Ideally, your first serve should go in 60 to 70 percent of the time and your second serve should move at about two-thirds of the speed of your first one. If you have trouble reaching those levels, you might consider being less ambitious on your first serve. Build your serve up from your second serve, not down from your first.

INTERMEDIATE

OBJECTIVE 1: Pick a target
Your first priority at this level is to master placement. Make sure you can direct serves to each of the three important locations in the service box: the forehand, the backhand, and right at your opponent’s body. Players tend to forget about the body serve, but it’s an important part of good strategy. Many receivers don’t handle the body blow well and you can use it to get your opponent off-balance so you can take advantage with your next shot. But most of your second serves should be aimed toward your opponent’s weaker side—just don’t become predictable. Mix it up by occasionally going toward his stronger wing or right at him. By doing this, you not only keep your opponent guessing, you also create opportunities to dictate play. And by serving to his strength you make it easier to target his weak side, which will help you get on the offensive after the serve. Practice this tactic by placing targets on the court and aiming for them.

OBJECTIVE 2: Experiment with spin
Adding spin to your serve gives you another dimension to play with. Spin adds margin for error to your serve—you can hit the ball higher and harder and it will still fall into the court—plus it produces tricky bounces that can confound your opponent. Start by learning the slice. It’s easier than the kick serve because it’s not quite as complicated and it’s a more natural motion for your body.

To hit the slice serve, toss the ball farther to the right (if you’re right-handed) than you would for a fl at serve and hit across the outside of the ball from 2 o’clock down to about 8 o’clock. Don’t do this solo. It’s best to get an instructor to help you lay the groundwork for a spin serve. As you get better, you can also begin experimenting with the kicker, too.

ADVANCED

OBJECTIVE 1: Notice your opponent’s tendencies
At this level you should have a pretty sound second serve in terms of technique, placement, and spin control. While you don’t want your second delivery to be overly aggressive, which invites double faults, you should serve with the intention of setting up the point so you can hit your second shot from a position of strength. For example, if you have a big forehand and you want to hit as many as you can once the point begins, figure out where to place your second serve to increase your chances of getting a return to your forehand. How you get this done will vary depending on your opponent’s tendencies and strengths, so there are no hard and fast rules here. Pay attention to your opponent’s patterns and tailor your second serve accordingly.

OBJECTIVE 2: Rely on your second serve in practice
There’s a saying in tennis that you’re only as good as your second serve. This is absolutely true. Your second serve is the foundation of your service game; it’s the shot you rely on when your first serve isn’t working well, so it has to be dependable under pressure. A great way to hone your second delivery is to play practice sets in which you get only one serve. This forces you to find a balance between aggression and consistency, which is exactly what you’re looking for in a good second serve.

Article by Paul Annacone, Illustrations by Craig Zuckerman – Tennis.com

Developing an effective stroke takes practice and hard work—most of the time. But follow these six steps and in15 minutes you’ll be on the road to unleashing a wicked slice serve.

1. ADJUST TO A SLICE GRIP
To hit an effective slice, you’ve got to start with the right grip. For many players, holding the racquet with a Continental grip allows them to put adequate slice on the ball. If this works for you, then stick with it. However, if you have trouble generating enough spin this way, I recommend adjusting your hand slightly beyond the Continental toward a backhand grip. This “slice grip” makes it easier for the edge of the racquet to lead the way toward contact, creating more brushing action against the side of the ball, and consequently extra slice.

2. MINIMIZE BODY MOVEMENT
There are a lot of moving parts to coordinate in a serve, but to establish the feel of slicing the ball, try to keep your body as quiet as possible throughout the motion. Your main focus is on the swing and the contact of the ball. To accentuate this part of the serve, imagine that you will create the whole motion while standing and rotating your body within a big cylinder or tube.

You’re hoping to eliminate any extraneous movements. Position your body weight forward in your stance and maintain strong, upright back posture throughout the motion. This will allow you to more accurately practice the brushing action at contact, while minimizing mis-hits off the frame. As you improve your ability to apply the slice spin, you can begin to incorporate more body movement into the swing.

3. USE THE NET POST TO ALIGN YOUR BODY
To properly coordinate your body, toss, and swing for a slice serve, the two net posts on the outside of the court can function as helpful points of reference. Establish a serving stance where your body is aligned with and facing the net post on the right side of the court (opposite for lefties). Now, turn your upper body so your shoulders are in a line perpendicular to the net. This alignment will facilitate and amplify the effectiveness of the rest of your service motion.

4. ACCURATELY PLACE THE SERVICE TOSS
Have your arm fully extended but relaxed as you begin your tossing motion. Line up your tossing arm with the net post and lift the ball along that line. You want to position the ball as though it were directly above the net post , but still well within your reach. The contact point for the slice is typically lower than what you ideally want for a hard flat serve. This will allow you to brush the outside part of the ball to better apply an upward sidespin to the serve.

5. THROW THE EDGE OF THE RACQUET AT THE BALL
To generate good slice, you have to swing as if you were intentionally trying to hit the ball with the side of the frame. Initially it may feel like you’re going to shank the ball off the edge of the racquet, but after a few tries you should get results.

Try to focus on the point of contact to avoid mishits, and swing upward to create the slice spin. Most players make the mistake of trying to cut straight across the ball and spin it down into the court. You should actually feel like you’re spinning the ball up off your strings. This creates an action on the ball that’s part topspin but mostly sidespin. Both are necessary: The sidespin puts a curve on the ball and topspin brings it down into the court.

Again, use the net post as a guide as you accelerate the racquet high above it to lightly brush up and across the outer side of the ball. When first experimenting, make an effort to graze the fuzz of the ball without making too much direct impact. As you get comfortable, start hitting more of the ball to add pace to the serve.

6. MAINTAIN YOUR FORM AND FOLLOW THROUGH
To maximize spin production you need racquet-head speed. That means the head of the racquet should travel much faster than the handle into contact. Like throwing a hatchet where the blade edge leads as it flips end over end, you want the leading edge of the racquet head to travel at top speed. The key to achieving this is to keep your wrist as relaxed as possible in the motion and avoid forcing the racquet head to snap.

With this emphasis on racquet-head speed, there’s a chance that your upper body may fold over or that you’ll swing too close to your chest. Make sure your follow-through is in line with—your new best friend—the net post. It may feel awkward at first to swing in the direction of the post to slice the ball. You must remember though, when you lead with the edge of the racquet, it will contact the ball on a severe angle. That, combined with the right-to-left spinning movement of the slice (opposite for lefties) will take your serve to the desired target. It’s like learning to throw a curveball in baseball. You first must overcome the fear of throwing the ball to the right of the catcher’s mitt and trust that the spin will take the ball into the strike zone. In tennis, the ball may start to the right, but after it hits the target it will continue to tail away from your opponent, creating a wicked slice serve.

Article by Pat Dougherty, Photos by Manuela Davies/Double Exposure – Tennis.com

PROBLEM
Your tossing arm drops prematurely and away from your body. This throws off the mechanics necessary for an effective serve. Your shoulders open too soon, causing your head to pull down and drag your upper body with it. You collapse over and drift into the court, making contact with the ball behind your body. The result is a poor serve that usually finds the net.

SOLUTION
When tossing the ball to serve, you want the arm to swing up straight from the shoulder and remain in that position until you begin to uncoil. As you start to rotate your upper body, the tossing arm should come down and tuck into your belly at contact. It almost looks as if you’re giving yourself a hug. This action will help you maintain proper body posture and stay in line with the ball as you build momentum to impact. Now you’ll better control the transition from a smooth back-swing to an explosive swing, and you’ll strike the ball with added power and accuracy.

Article by Juan Nuñez, Photos by Manuela Davies/Propix – Tennis.com

PAY ATTENTION TO YOUR FRONT FOOT
To manipulate the placement of your serve, you must first have control over your balance. Many players blame a bad toss for problems with their service accuracy, but I think you should look at the feet first. If your front foot is moving around to accommodate an errant toss, you’re going to hit from an unstable base. It’s fine to drag your back foot up during your service motion, but that front foot, apart from turning slightly to assist your upper-body rotation, should stay where it is.

In fact, most of the time your toss should be in line with your front big toe, give or take an inch or two. If you can consistently put the toss in that location, you’ll have a better opportunity to control your serve. The big mistake players make is changing the toss to help hit to a target. Obviously, if you’re hitting a kick serve, the toss will have to move more behind your head, but on your basic power first serve the toss needs to be more in line with your front foot, no matter what direction you’re aiming the ball in.

USE GOOD SHOULDER ROTATION
Not only does turning your shoulders add power to your shot, but it aids in accuracy as well. Too often recreational players simply face the net. This forces more of the power burden to fall on the serving arm, which can cause a loss of accuracy. The players who hit their locations most frequently generally have a healthy shoulder turn. This also provides good disguise during the preparation phase of the serve and will give your opponent trouble when he’s trying to read where you’re aiming.

PRACTICE HITTING TARGETS
There are three primary locations you are going to serve to—out wide, into your opponent’s body, and down the middle. While there are variations depending on the amount and type of spin you use, these are the crucial spots.

The best way to practice hitting these locations is to set up targets that cover a decent-sized area. Don’t limit yourself to a space the size of a tennis ball, because that’s unrealistic and would become too frustrating to try to hit. And avoid trying to crush the ball. Rather, focus on good rhythm, timing, toss, and location. Attempt to hit the same target no more than three to five times in a row. This will prevent you from altering your toss or service action in order to hit that spot. A fourth target to consider is a shorter angle on a wide slice serve. You can place it a couple of inches from the singles sideline and several feet up from the service line. This serve is great for pulling your opponent outside of the court and out of position.

MOVE THE RETURNER AROUND
There are two locations to be concerned with on the serve—the spot where the ball lands, and, perhaps more important, where the opponent makes his return. For example, say you’re a right-handed player trying to hit the ball down the T in the deuce court. If you hit a serve with some slice (which curves from right to left), the ball may land near the T, but it will curve toward your opponent. It may still be a good shot, but a flatter serve that lands in the same spot will stay farther away from your opponent and potentially be a more difficult return.

On the other hand, if you’re a righty and serving from the deuce side, that same slice serve placed out wide will curve away from your opponent more than a flat serve hit to the same location will. So you have to experiment with your serves and spins to figure out the spots you need to hit to stretch or jam your opponents. Depending on the flight path of your serve you may have to start the ball directly at the target or slightly to one side to achieve the desired effect. That’s why placement and spin are just as important as pace when it comes to the success of your serve.

Article by Nick Saviano, Photos By Lara Tomlin – Tennis.com

For many, the second serve is a measuring stick. If you have one that consistently goes in and, just as important, prevents your opponent from going on the offensive, then you’re a player. That’s where the kick serve comes in— it’s the ultimate second serve. It bounces up high and twists away from your opponents, confusing them and taking the ball out of their strike zone. This disrupts their timing and positioning and can cause them to be conservative or even defensive on the return. And being able to hit a good kick serve adds a degree of difficulty to your game that opens up other options. If you hit your serve predominantly with only one spin and trajectory, your opponent will get comfortable with it. But mixing in a kick serve, even on your first offerings, can keep the other guy off-balance. It’s a great serve to follow to net because it gives you time to move in and the height of the ball makes it difficult to return at your feet. Most of all, if you have a reliable kick serve, you’ll take more chances on your first serve, making it more dangerous. No doubt, the kick is a tricky and difficult shot to learn. But with the proper technique and practice, anybody can own this valuable weapon. Here are the five essential elements of the kicker.

1. Toss the ball behind your head. On a first, or flat, serve, you want to hit the ball when it’s at the peak of the toss in front of your body. The kick serve is different because you want to hit the ball while it’s still in motion and behind your body.

For example, if you’re right-handed, you want the toss to be to your left and behind your body so that when your racquet contacts the ball it creates a left-to-right spin, which will jump away from your opponent. You’ll have to experiment to see where the toss works best for you, but a general guideline is to make contact at 11 o’clock (1 o’clock for lefties, who will generate a right-to-left spin), with 12 o’clock being directly above your head.

To test your toss, have your coach stand behind you and hold a racquet in line with your body before you begin your motion. For a kick serve you want the ball to be to the left of the racquet (right for lefties); for a flatter serve you’d want the toss to be to the right.

2. Bend your knees and bring your hips forward. When learning any shot, the right technique is important because not only does it yield the most success in execution, but it also helps prevent injury. Because the toss is behind the head, many times when players try to hit a kick serve they severely arch backwards. Then they twist forward to hit the ball, putting tremendous strain on the lower back. That will hurt your serve and eventually your body.

Instead, as the toss goes up, bend your knees and bring your pelvis forward. This will help keep you balanced with your weight evenly distributed and force you to reach for the ball instead of leaning with your back. On a first serve, with the ball in front, you really load up your front leg. Here the ball is behind you so you need your weight balanced between your legs, which helps you get more power and better control.

3. Spring toward the ball, keeping your head and hitting elbow up. The main thing that people do wrong after they execute a good toss and knee bend is they crouch down while they swing. It looks as if they’re folding over at the waist. This is problematic for putting pace and spin on the ball. You must extend and reach up to use your full force and get power on the serve. The upward thrust is key for completely straightening the back and beginning the uncoiling of the upper body.

After the racquet head drops down, the hitting elbow should be at least at shoulder level. You can achieve this by keeping your head up and holding your tossing arm in position a split-second longer than usual. When a player pulls his head down, or the tossing arm starts to drift and drop too soon, the upper body often comes with it. Keeping your head and tossing arm up while straightening the legs will get you in the best position to allow your racquet to whip through the hitting zone.

4. Brush up the back of the ball with as much racquet-head speed as a first serve. When players first learn the kick serve, the concept of swinging up on the ball is tricky. Most feel they’re going to hit it over the fence, so they try to spin the ball toward the box instead of up and generally hit a very short serve or one that doesn’t clear the net. One way to get the sensation of brushing up the back of the ball is to put some towels on the court and serve from your knees. From this position you have to swing up in order to clear the net (and not smack your racquet into the court). Concentrate on trying to get the ball up 6 to 10 feet over the net and allow the spin to bring it down into the box. Using a Continental grip (even slightly toward a backhand grip) is strongly recommended.

The wrist should also play a huge role in the racquet accelerating up the back of the ball. You can practice the snapping motion of the wrist without holding a racquet. Simply hold the ball in your off hand and brush up the back of it with the palm of your hitting hand to get comfortable with the wrist action. The other thing to keep in mind with your swing is to let it go. So many people, because it’s a second serve, decelerate the racquet. You have to trust that the heavy topspin you’re putting on the ball will keep it in the court.

5. Uncoil at the top of your swing and follow through. After you reach up to hit the serve, your upper body should uncoil toward your target. When you can’t reach any higher, the racquet is naturally going to go forward. You don’t want to uncoil too soon by bringing your back leg around because you would prematurely face the net. This would cause you to fall to your left (right for lefties) and drain your shot of power and spin, not to mention leave you off-balance and out of position for the next shot. Try to keep your arm loose and allow it to finish naturally and help prepare you for your opponent’s return.

Article by Juan Nuñez and Brenda Schulz-Mccarhy, Photos By TENNIS Magazine – Tennis.com

You can argue about many things when it comes to playing tennis, but there’s one issue that’s not debatable—the racquet hits the ball. And the simple fact is, if you want the ball to travel fast or with a lot of spin, the racquet has to move quickly to do it. All the bending, twisting, and grunting in the world won’t do you any good if your racquet is slow. So if you’re looking to rip your serve, the first thing you have to consider is what your racquet is doing. Put the shoulder turn and deep knee bend on the sideline for now because the smartest way to increase the pace on your serve is to speed up your racquet. Here are some drills and tips to help you achieve that.

FAST ARM
Use only your upper body. At the 2004 WTA championships last November, Serena Williams suffered an abdominal injury in the final against Maria Sharapova. Because of this ailment, Serena served the entire third set using only her upper body. With this abbreviated motion she still reached 90 m.p.h. on the radar gun and hit a couple of aces. Unfortunately, she didn’t have enough to win, but you could see how much power she could muster just by using her upper body.

So practice your serve while eliminating your lower body. I’ve had students stand in ball hoppers to keep their legs quiet, but you can do it by serving just like Serena did. You simply toss the ball and accelerate the racquet. By taking away a part of the body, you’re forcing the other elements to do more.

Have your coach or friend toss the ball for you. Sometimes, by disrupting your timing on the serve, you can speed up your racquet. I’ve found that players actually serve much faster when I toss the ball for them. I intentionally toss the ball a little low so the player is forced to get the racquet to the contact point more quickly. This breaks up the original rhythm, which for whatever reason was a little bit slow or disconnected, and gets the racquet flying.

Try it yourself by getting into serving position and having someone stand off to your right (left for lefties) and toss the ball in front of you. Don’t be concerned with a big shoulder turn or loading up your legs. You’re just trying to whip your racquet around as quickly as possible.

LOOSE WRIST
Hold the racquet with just your thumb and index finger. Strange as it may sound, some players try too hard when they serve. They want to hit the ball with such force that their bodies get tense, especially their arms. When you squeeze the grip tightly, your wrist practically locks and the racquet slows down. So even though you think you’re swinging with all you’ve got, the racquet is sluggish. Combat this and get the feeling of a loose wrist and free-flowing racquet by hitting serves while holding the grip with only the thumb and index finger. Now you’re allowing the racquet to move naturally and do the work instead of muscling the ball. The wrist is more playful and snaps the racquet through contact. After experimenting with this kind of grip, you’ll better understand how much tension to have in your arm and hand when using all your fingers on the serve.

Snap balls into the court using only your wrist. Most players don’t do exercises or drills that enhance the fluidity of the wrist. There’s one that I call “wristers” that’s helpful in developing a good snapping action. Hold your racquet with a Continental grip and bend your wrist forward so that it’s bowed. Lean forward slightly at the waist, toss a ball around waist level in front of you and snap it down into the court using only your wrist. There are two things you’re looking for here: (1) the sound that the ball makes when it hits the court, and (2) the height that it gets. Obviously, playing on a hard surface will help, but you’re trying to get an explosive sound and the ball 20 to 30 feet in the air. If you use a lot of arm or shoulder rotation, you’ll have trouble generating much pop and you may fall over or hit yourself on the follow-through. Using the wrist is the best way to achieve these two goals, and it will carry over into helping you get a good snap on your serves and overheads.

RELAXED AND FLUID MOTION
Swing a towel to eliminate any hitches and enhance the smoothness of your service action. The best servers make it look easy. When they serve, the arm moves freely and the racquet never stops. A common problem for players who have trouble getting pace on the serve is that their motion is too mechanical. Their parts aren’t connected and as a result many times the racquet pauses during the delivery. One way to cure this is to take a beach towel and tie a knot at one end. That will function as your racquet head. Grab the other end and perform your service motion. When you get to the top of your motion, the knot will naturally drop the towel down, allowing you to swing forward. At the completion of the serve, go right into another without stopping. At no point should the towel hit any part of your body, but more importantly, this is how light your racquet should feel on your service motion. You should never feel like you’re trying to serve. It’s an effortless motion that will reward you with something I call “liquid power.”

TAKE-NO-PRISONERS ATTITUDE
Use a radar gun. I think it’s very helpful to have goals to shoot for. Some coaches and players don’t like to use radar guns because they think a player shouldn’t be consumed with serve speed. But I see a definite difference in people’s intensity levels when they know their serves are being clocked. The simple fact is they want to serve harder than the next guy, and that causes them to let go and try to tear the cover off the ball. It’s no longer about the lines and getting it in. If you don’t have a radar gun, turn around and serve as hard as you can into the fence. Or serve from the baseline and try to hit the fence on the other side of the court. People at the club level seem to serve harder in these instances because they’re not trying to hit it in. There are no repercussions, so they’re totally relaxed. The goal is to adopt the same mind-set when you do need to get the serve in the box. If you do, I guarantee you’ll have a lot more zip on your delivery.

Article by Rick Macci, Photos by Manuela Davies/Propix – Tennis.com

Most players think of the serve as a power shot. But that’s shortsighted. Sure, hitting aces and service winners are desirable results, but it’s not realistic to rely on such shots. To be an effective server, you need to learn to use your serve in an offensive way to construct a point. It’s a different philosophy from trying to serve your opponent off the court. To me, there’s a subtle art to moving your serve around to different parts of the box and mixing up your pace and spin so you can be aggressive from your first shot. It’s using your serve as a setup shot rather than a finisher. Here’s how to get it done.

BEGINNER

OBJECTIVE: Develop a consistent toss and learn the slice.
When you’re starting out, learning to hit different locations on a regular basis starts with a consistent ball toss. If your toss is regularly in the right spot, you can get away with some idiosyncrasies in your motion. Your first goal should be to keep the toss out in front of your body—just about in line with your hitting shoulder— and make contact at full extension. Once you can control the toss, concentrate on placing the serve. The slice out wide is an effective delivery to add to your game. For a right-handed player this means using that serve in the deuce court (ad side for lefties) and dragging your opponent into the doubles alley. Toss the ball around 1 o’clock (11 o’clock for lefties) and hit the right outside edge to create slice. The spin naturally pulls the ball off the court. If you’re successful with this serve, you’ll have a great one-two punch: go out wide, then hit into the open court. Forcing a beginner to hit on the move will win you many points. Again, this is a setup shot rather than a power serve. Also, remember that you want to be on the baseline or inside it after your serve to respond to a potentially weak reply. Don’t serve and back up. Once you know that your slice is well-placed, make sure you’re in an offensive position so you can take advantage of it.

INTERMEDIATE

OBJECTIVE: Incorporate more power sources and move your serves around.
Things can get a little complicated at this stage. Although you don’t want to adopt a pure-power mindset, to be effective you do need to put some pace on the ball. But you have to balance that with consistency and accuracy. At the beginner level, players tend to rely mostly on their arms to get power on the ball. Now you have to start using more of your body and incorporating big muscle groups into your motion. Start with shoulder rotation. Turn away from your opponent during your back-swing and uncoil toward your target as you move your racquet to contact. Then try to focus on getting your legs to drive you up and into the court. Tapping into more power sources while maintaining the fundamental mechanics of the service motion will give you controllable and consistent power.

As your serve develops, so should your tactics. Diversifying your locations will keep your opponents off-guard and open up opportunities on your second ball. Serve and volley occasionally, or, if you’ve started to use one, hit a kick on your first serve up high to your opponent’s backhand— these plays will disrupt his return rhythm. And when you get to a big point, it’s a smart play to serve to your opponent’s more vulnerable side, as this will put pressure on him to come up with a big reply.

ADVANCED

OBJECTIVE: Set up your strengths and practice hitting to locations.
Ironically, sometimes serving at advanced levels can require less thought than serving at other stages of development. If you’re a pure server with a huge delivery, many times you can rely on that skill to overpower your opponents. They know what’s coming, but it’s tough for them to do anything about it. Still, there aren’t many rec players with this ability, so I think it’s important to structure a strategy that plays to your strengths. For instance, let’s say you have a formidable forehand that you like to use to control rallies. A good, hard serve up the middle or into the body in the deuce court is a difficult shot for your opponent to pull back toward your backhand. You now have an opportunity to step around the ball and hit your favorite shot. Using a high-bouncing kick out wide in the ad court is another way to set up the forehand. But beware of your location on wide serves. Whereas beginners often have trouble with this serve, if you give advanced players a lot of angle and don’t put them on the defensive, they’ll hurt you with the return. In other words, placement, more than pace, is key.

Much of your success will revolve around hitting spots with your serve. If you can’t do that at this level, your opponents are going to zero in on your serves and take advantage of your inconsistency. Practicing your location by setting up targets wide, into the body, and down the T is a reliable method for improving the accuracy of your serves. Make sure you can hit different spins to each location, too. Just like a pitcher in baseball, you want to be able to spot the ball with each of your serves to keep the returner guessing.

Article by Paul Annacone, Illustrations by Jim Chow – Tennis.com

I’ve always been confused as to why recreational players who struggle so much with their second serves don’t try something different. Whether it’s mental or technical, they donate games’ worth of points by tossing in double faults and sitting ducks. I think if you can’t get the job done with the standard serving motion, you should consider experimenting with an underhand topspin-drive serve. While unconventional, it’s totally legal, and if done properly it’s effective and reliable.

To try it, hold the racquet with your regular forehand grip. Set up with your weight loaded on your back leg. Drop the ball out of your tossing hand and take a vigorous low-to-high swing while transferring your weight forward. It’s like feeding a ball in practice, only you hit it with more conviction, direction, and spin. Make sure you get plenty of shoulder turn to provide momentum and use your legs to explode into the shot. The more racquet acceleration you have, the more spin and action you’ll get on the ball.

You should be able to direct the shot to any part of the service box (particularly your opponent’s weaker side) and the topspin will kick the ball up, making it difficult to attack. If you prefer, start a few feet behind the baseline to allow for a step forward with your front foot. This will also leave you balanced and in position for the return.

If you’re stuck with a powder-puff second serve, you’ll be amazed at the confidence that you’ll get from starting a point this way. Don’t be surprised if someday soon somebody on TV is using this serve.

Article by Rick Macci, Photos by Manuela Davies/Propix – Tennis.com

For recreational players, the topspin serve is a defining stroke. With it, you have a reliable second serve that safely clears the net, dips in, and jumps off the court. Without it, you’re not going to move up the ladder any time soon. These five basic tips, plus four serving drills, will help you isolate and master the components of an effective topspin serve and get you that much closer to the kick.

1. GRIP
There’s no single technique for an effective topspin serve, but there are certain fundamentals that every player must use,
beginning with the grip. The relaxed Continental grip you use for your flat and slice serves is the best place to start—there’s no need for an extreme grip. When you’re ready for a full-fl edged kicker, you can experiment with a backhand grip, which is shifted slightly over from Continental (right-handers shift their hands to the left; lefties to the right).

2. STANCE
Set your feet shoulder-width apart with your front foot angled toward the net post (the right post for righties, the left one for lefties). This will allow your hips and shoulders to rotate during the loading phase (see “Toss and Loading Phase” on the next page). As you begin your motion, you’ll transfer your weight to your back foot and then shift it forward. You can use either a platform stance, where you keep your feet apart, or the “foot up” or “pinpoint” technique, in which the back foot moves up right behind the front foot before the swing. Both stances are effective.

3. TOSS AND LOADING PHASE
Proper placement of the toss is essential for an effective topspin serve. Toss—“place” is a more apt description—the ball in front of you and slightly to the outside of your front foot (right-handers should place it to the left of the front foot; lefties to the right). This toss shouldn’t be quite as far to the left or right, or quite as close to the body, as the toss you would use for a full kick serve. For now, you just want the ball to clear the net comfortably, with enough spin to bring it down into the box. Don’t worry about whether the ball jumps off the court or bounces away from a right-hander’s backhand, the way right-handed pros’ kick serves do.

To begin, move your weight onto your back foot and start your toss holding the ball with the tips of your fingers and your palm facing upward. Lift your tossing arm up alongside your body, moving your arm parallel to the baseline. This will help you rotate your trunk. Stay relaxed as you move your arms up and release the ball. The loading phase starts when your shoulders and hips begin to rotate (clockwise for right-handers; counterclockwise for lefties) and away from the net as your legs bend or “load.” Your back should remain straight, with no arch, and you should be looking up at the ball. The picture to the left shows the end of this phase: Your knees should be bent, your hips and shoulders fully rotated (the shoulders slightly more than the hips), your racquet pointing upward, and your tossing arm fully extended in the “trophy” position.

4. HITTING
It’s time to unleash the energy that was stored in the loading phase. Straighten your legs to propel yourself upward and drop your racquet head. As your racquet accelerates up to the ball, your shoulders should uncoil (righties will rotate counterclockwise; lefties will rotate clockwise), transferring energy from your legs and trunk to your arm. To generate topspin, imagine that the back of the ball is a clock and brush up on it from 7 to 1 o’clock if you’re a righty or 5 to 11 o’clock if you’re a lefty.

5. SWING PATH AND FOLLOW-THROUGH
Your swing should be a “shoulder over shoulder” motion, similar to when you do a cartwheel. After you toss the ball, keep your non-hitting arm pointing up for as long as you can. Players who pull this arm down too soon often hit serves into the net. Your non-hitting arm should come down just before you make contact with the ball and tuck into your stomach as you follow through. The force of your legs will drive you into the court, and you should land on one foot (your left foot if you’re right-handed; your right if you’re left-handed). Your follow-through should end on your non-dominant side.

Article by Debbie Graham Shaffer – Tennis.com

Nineteen-year-old rising star Andy Murray of Scotland has assaulted the rankings in the last two years, moving nearly 500 spots to his current position inside the Top 40. Solid in every aspect of his game, Murray uses his serve to dictate play right from the get-go. And with a few minor changes, he could make it even better.

1. This is a typical stance for most players. It has no significance as far as racquet acceleration and power— each player simply has his or her own way of beginning to focus on the serve. One note: When my partner, Dr. Gideon Ariel, and I analyzed subjects who used this stance, with the racquet extended, there was an increase in the activity in their trapezius (neck and shoulder) muscles. Some players actually got a little stiff using this method. That’s why baseball pitchers shrug their shoulders and exhale to relax the muscles before throwing.

2. Notice that Murray’s tossing hand is nearly parallel to the baseline rather than extended toward his opponent. This causes his body to coil, and it’s the uncoiling of the body in a particular sequence from the ground up that generates racquet speed. That sequence is called the “kinetic chain.” Notice also that Murray’s dominant arm is extended backward. Many players think they should look like the classic serving trophy, with the hitting elbow tucked way down behind them. But that trophy designer must have had a pitiful serve.

3. At this point, Murray brings his back foot up toward his front, which momentarily stops him from uncoiling his body. He relies on loading the muscles in his upper body rather than generating a complete kinetic chain. His knees are bent to activate a forward and upward movement. While the knee bend is an initiator of the kinetic chain, in our research we found that the knee bend alone was not a huge factor in serve speed and generated less than 10 m.p.h. for most subjects.

4. Here is where Murray fails to maximize his racquet-head speed. His body isn’t going as forward and upward as it could be. He tosses the ball farther back than, say, Andy Roddick does. In our research center, we found that the greatest racquet speed was produced when the player’s upper arm was going up and forward toward the net, as in a baseball pitch. Murray’s upper arm is traveling more upward than forward, which will limit his speed.

5. Murray makes contact with the ball at the peak of the toss, which has major advantages in serving percentages. One or two inches in height can often mean the difference between an ace or a ball that hits the tape. Andy continues to uncoil his body, which helps to increase racquet-head speed. Note that Murray’s feet have left the ground. If you jump to hit the ball before the upper arm has achieved maximum speed, you’ll lose power. This is not true if the ball is tossed out front and the server is pulled off the ground when he reaches for it.

6. Murray has one foot behind the baseline when he lands. (Roddick lands more than 2 feet inside the baseline.) It’s important to get the toss as far out in front as you can. As Murray’s game continues to improve, I think you’ll see him tossing the ball farther out toward the net to maximize racquet-head speed, while remaining properly balanced to attack the net or play the point out from the baseline.

Article by Vic Braden, Photos by Tommy Hindley – Tennis.com