How to Relax Under Pressure

Increasingly the Essential Tennis Forums are a wonderful place for tennis enthusiasts everywhere to gather and share their problems, triumphs, and other thoughts about tennis. That is where the subject for this blog comes from, it’s a question written there by Darius, who goes by Dariusn in the forums. He wrote and said:

“I noticed recently that after a while, my hitting arm will slightly throb or feel really warm during a match or sometimes during practice when playing a pseudo match.

The sensation will come from the bicep and sometimes the tricep. So I am figuring out that I am arming the ball. I dunno where this is coming from, it is most likely from serving and maybe during a power shot WW forehand. If I continue down this path, I have a feeling that I will development a chronic condition of arm problems.

I know that the key is to relax when playing especially on serve, but it is sometimes hard to do so when adrenaline is pumping especially through a crucial match where you just want to smash the ball out of play for your point or trying to serve it very well. Are there any pointers to staying relaxed even through the most crucial moments during a match?”

You’ve brought up an extremely important topic Darius! Anything we can do to decrease the chances of injury is certainly worth while, since our enjoyment of tennis could hinge on such things.

Physical and Technical Implications

Before I talk about ways to avoid becoming tense during match play I feel it’s important for you to understand exactly how essential keeping your body relaxed is to your progression as a tennis player. There are three main reasons:

Injury

Playing tennis well requires your body to make long, sweeping motions with your arms, shoulders and core as well as very intense amounts of footwork. When you become physically tight your muscles tense up, and are much more difficult to contract and move. Continuing to force them to move over and over as you swing at the ball or sprint towards it puts them under considerably more strain which can quickly lead to an overuse injury such as tennis elbow. Keeping your muscles loose and relaxed so that they can move fluidly and efficiently will help minimize injury.

Efficiency

Even if your tensing up during tennis doesn’t result in a painful injury and time away from the sport, it will still cause you to use up more energy than necessary to compete. Let your body work as its made to by allowing your muscles to move freely.

Better Technique

Day after day I’m on the court with club level tennis players that are literally holding themselves back physically. When you swing your racket should move freely and smoothly, very often lower level players have tight muscles before, during, and after contact with the ball which results in short, jerky swings. From level to level in tennis, very typically the better the player, the longer the swing to achieve more power, spin, and control over the ball. Don’t hold yourself back!

Overcoming Tense Moments

So you might be saying to me now: “Well that’s all fine and dandy Ian, but I can’t control my tension! Every time I play a match and a big point comes up I just tighten up!” Well first of all please don’t think you’re the only one, everybody deals with this from time to time, even the pros, and some people chronically every time they play. Unfortunately there’s no silver bullet to overcoming this, just as everybody has different physical attributes to which certain playing styles lend themselves, each individual player deals with mental issues differently as well. Below are four suggestions you can try to relieve your mind, and in turn your body within a pressure situation.

Focus on Your Strategy

When you’re getting ready to play a really important point in your match, the last thing you want to do is put your mental focus on thinking about just how critical it is that you succeed. Worse yet is thinking about how terrible it would be if you failed, these types of thoughts need to be put out of your head as quickly and as often as possible, and you can do that by replacing them with a solid game plan to focus on. You chose which thoughts to linger on, and which to push aside and ignore, dismiss negative or tension building thoughts and replace them with a strategy to accomplish. This doesn’t have to be complicated at all, it can simply be “cross court return, cross court return”, or “serve to the backhand, volley cross court”. Just make sure its specific and appropriate to your skills and abilities. Give your brain something else to work on!

Focus on the Ball

The most generic advice in all of tennis right? Trust me, focusing on the ball is a powerful mental tool. Just like the suggestion above about focusing on a strategy we’re giving our mind something else to occupy itself with, taking our conscious attention away from how incredibly important this point is perceived to be. I personally use this one very often as I compete (in paddle tennis more than regular tennis lately). As the toss goes up to be hit by the server my eyes are fixed intently on it already, and I often times literally think or even say to myself over and over “ball, ball, ball, ball” as I step forwards and split step to receive the oncoming ball. What could be more important to focus on than the ball? Pretend its just you and it out there and nothing else matters, play the ball and not the situation.

Waiting to Exhale

Make sure that you continue to breathe during a point as you make your strokes. This is why the pros “grunt”, it’s the release of a breath usually timed with making contact with the ball. This release helps relax the body, and therefore get the most possible result from their efforts. If you don’t already release a breath as you hit the ball try it next time you go out to practice, and make it a habit. It doesn’t mean you have to grunt, but as you start hitting the ball stronger and more aggressively you may find one come out once in a while along with your breath!

Enjoy the Pressure!

Some of you out there are saying “What?! Enjoy it? You’re crazy.” This is a mental attitude that can be learned, and I promise you that the vast majority of high level players out there adopt it. Rather than dreading those big points and focusing on how bad it will be if you fail, consider the opposite. How awesome is it that you’re able to get out there to compete against another athlete, and fight hard to contest a match of body and mind. Just being on a court to compete gets me all pumped up and excited, and by the way this excitement is very often referred to as “nerves” by lesser experienced players. Instead of being scared of that big point at the end of the match, relish the idea that you even get to participate in something so cool in the first place. Not only that, but you’re now being presented with an opportunity to show what you’re made up and come away victorious! This is a privilege, and something you should learn to appreciate very much, rather than dread.

Feeling nervous and anxious is completely normal and universal, how you think about it and react to it are totally up to you!

Playing Tennis is a Privilege

Over the past few months I’ve had a topic running through my head that I really want to get out there in the open. It’s one of many topics that I’m writing about as it pertains specifically to tennis, however the lesson can be applied to just about anything in life. That’s one of the many reasons that I enjoy teaching tennis so much, it’s always my hope that people on my court don’t just learn about an athletic skill, but rather learn lessons that can touch many other aspects of life. When that happens my job is truly rewarding. This topic is not unique, it’s not extremely deep or creative, but it’s something I feel very strongly about and simply wish to communicate to all my listeners and readers.

Playing Tennis is a Privilege

My wife and I recently took a trip to the Bahamas, it was our first vacation together by ourselves and we had a very relaxing time which was exactly our goal in mind. Neither of us has done much traveling outside of the United States, and were immediately taken aback by the living conditions on Nassau after coming into port there. The residential areas consisted of run down homes with only a few rooms in them, some were literally only shacks with roofs that were patched together out of corrugated steel. Almost all had garbage littered everywhere outside, sometimes in piles. This may have been easier to stomach if we hadn’t taken our bus tour of the town immediately after a boat ride around Paradise Island showcasing decadent homes of multi-millionaire actors and celebrities. Scenes like this always touch me anyway, but to drive the point home even further, this happened to be during the week of Thanksgiving. Talk about being reminded of what I’m thankful for.

Why am I spending my time and space on a web site talking about sad conditions such as these? Because having experiences such as these gives me such a deep appreciation and thankfulness that I’m able to pursue a leisure activity such as tennis. This appreciation is part of what drives me to do my best every time I step on a court, both in playing and teaching, and it’s my hope that you learn to keep this in perspective as well. Don’t ever take for granted that you have the luxuries of time, money, physical ability, and facilities to go out and pursue excellence in such a wonderful sport such as ours. Some of us have more or less of these luxuries than others, but if you’re reading this article right now chances are you’re much more equipped in all four of these areas than a lot of the people in the world, and for that be thankful!

Unfortunately I’m embarrassed to say that I’ve not always lived up to the noble ideals written about above. I’ve thrown my racket in anger on the court, I’ve been down in a match and allowed my attitude to be sour, I’ve coasted through lessons at the end of long a day on the court. What does this make me? Completely human, and I’m sure you can relate. I’m not proud of any of those things, but I can be proud of my desire and effort to improve all of them little by little.

Next time you catch yourself getting down on the court, only giving partial effort, or complaining about your practice conditions and partner please take a step back, close your eyes, and think for a few seconds. Grip the court with your toes below you, turn the tennis ball between your fingers, feel the sun on your face if you happen to be outside, take a deep breath, and smile. You get to play tennis, what a blessing.

It’s OK to Miss!

There are two very general, main types of tennis players out there. One group is happy to play for the sheer enjoyment of it. Whether it be the exercise, socializing with friends, or just having something to do to get them out of the house. Group number two plays for the challenge of it. This isn’t to say that they don’t enjoy their time put in as well, however there’s more focus involved, a more serious tone is part of their practice and play.

This article is written to group number two.

Ever get angry after missing a shot in tennis? Call yourself names out loud? Have the sudden urge to break the only thing at your disposal (racket)? I can confidently say I’ve done all those things, many times all after the same swing, heh. Why must we take ourselves that seriously, that not hitting a successful shot during an enjoyable, athletic past time should result in such negative emotions?

It’s my goal here at Essential Tennis to not only help you improve your tennis, but learn how to enjoy the process of learning more as well. I’ve personally struggled with lots of negativity in the past, and I’m here to tell you it doesn’t have to be that way. Below are four reasons why it’s perfectly OK to miss. Chances are that if you deal with anger on the court, one or two of these will resonate strongly with you. If that is the case, I urge you write the phrases down that do, and keep them in mind the next time you play.

It’s OK to Lose

Did you hear me? Losing is a natural part of competition, it’s a bi-product of putting yourself and your game on the line against an opponent. This risk is necessary, without it winning would be meaningless wouldn’t it? Please take a minute to let that sink in and fully accept it. If you compete, eventually you will lose, it’s just a part of the process. It doesn’t make you a bad player, it doesn’t make you a bad person, it makes you a competitor, period.

That means that within every point, every single time you take a swing at the ball there is always a chance that you will win, and a chance that you will lose (miss). Accept this as a fact of tennis, and don’t allow it to bother you and throw you off emotionally when it happens. I guarantee you it WILL happen, so there’s absolutely no sense in getting bent out of shape about it and allowing it to negatively effect your game play. Instead, after a miss quickly critique in your head what the mistake in technique or strategy was, and do your best to improve upon that next time that specific shot occurs.

Accept it: Tennis is Difficult

This has taken a long time for me to accept personally, and I’ve seen several other players reject this fact as well resulting in anger on the court. Tennis is really hard to be truly good at, if you don’t agree with me get ready for frustration, either that or you need to start playing against higher level opponents. When you’re working on improving an specific stroke or strategy don’t be frustrated when attempts to implement it into point play initially fail. Mastering complicated physical movements like tennis and most other sports takes huge amounts of time and concentration, cut yourself some slack and allow yourself to screw it up at first. Of course if you’re continuing to screw it up the same way over and over then take note and figure out why so that you can fix it either then or later. If you don’t know the answer to the question “why?”, then seek out the council of somebody who does, very preferably somebody who answers such questions for a living so the answer will accurate and relevant to your problem.

I find that often times this syndrome is further enhanced by the watching of professional matches on TV. They often times make the game look so easy, in fact more than a few times I’ve heard comments from people who’ve never played before about how easy tennis must be after seeing it on TV. “You just hit it over the net!”

It’s a Tool for Improvement

That’s right, making errors helps you improve your tennis game, that is if you’re paying attention and keeping a good attitude about it. This is one of many life lessons that can be learned on a tennis court: every mistake made gives the opportunity for improvement. Every time you strike a tennis ball and miss the court, or even just miss your target by a little bit, there’s a technical reason why it happened.

I would highly discourage you from taking that statement and analyzing every single shot you hit on the court, however pay attention to patterns of misses. If you miss a short forehand long three times in a row, or four times out of six, there’s a problem there that must be addressed. If you’re smart, you’ll keep a little journal in your racket bag where you can write such things down so that next time you’re on a practice court or taking a lesson the issue can be worked on. In this fashion your game can be continually improved as long as you invest the necessary focus and effort.

So there you have it. Making errors can either throw you into a poor mood hampering your performance and improvement, or be an aid in the development of your game. With the right attitude mistakes can lead to bigger and better things both in tennis and in life.

Flexibility, How it Affects Your Game

I recently got this question from Chris in Maryland via the website:

“Flexibility: every time you see djokovic play, a commentator will mention how flexible he is and how much that helps his game. How do you think flexibility fits into tennis, and how could one work on being more flexible?”

Great question Chris. At first glance it may seem like the main purpose of achieving better flexibility would be to prevent injury, and surely that’s a very important part of it. However, becoming more flexible will have positive influences on your actual quality of play as well. Lets talk about why.

ROM is King

Want more power, more spin, and more depth to your shots? Of course you do, that’s what everybody is looking for in this modern day game of tennis. What does flexibility have to do with that? The more flexible your body is, the greater effective range of motion (ROM) it will have. Having great ROM is extremely vital to hitting high level shots, the reason being a long swing is necessary to create the kind of acceleration needed to create a big shot using your ground strokes, serve, or overhead.

The Equation for Power

When teaching somebody for the first time how to hit a ground stroke correctly I often tell them that the momentum on their shot will equal the length of their swing times the speed the racket was moving at contact. Do you have a short swing? Then you’re going to have to try and accelerate the racket much faster over that shorter period of time than somebody who has a longer more relaxed swing to get the same results as them. The longer your swing is the greater your potential for power and spin. The more flexible your body is, the easier its going to be to obtain that length of swing.

What “Length” Really Means

So I’m imagining you sitting there thinking about making a huge, high looping forehand back swing in order to get more length to your swing, that’s not exactly correct. “Longer” is a relative term. If you’re already a 4.5+ player (which Chris happens to be) then you know how to hit the ball strongly and confidently, chances are you already use your ROM pretty well and other things are going to be a bigger determinant to moving up in level again. If you’re a 3.0 player however, I guarantee that the way you’re swinging now is very short and tentative in comparison, you will have to learn how to make a longer more aggressive swing if you want to improve.

What Part Needs to be Flexible?

Check out Djokovic in that photo at the top, he’s demonstrating ridiculous flexibility there, it’s really amazing. His stance is well over past a closed (right foot over across his left for a backhand ground stroke), and yet he’s been able to fully rotate his shoulders forwards in order to make an aggressive swing. This is where being an incredible natural athlete and training day in and day out pays off on the court for a professional player, these are moves that the vast majority of us can only dream of.

So what parts of your body need to be flexible most for create length and strength in your swings? Core flexibility is huge, that’s what Djokovic is demonstrating above. Also very important is the flexibility of your shoulders, forearms, legs and hips. I won’t get into exactly how to stretch here, but maybe I can do a video lesson with Dr. Jack to show us how!

Don’t Choke! Deceleration Dicussed

Anybody who has played a single match in an organized tournament knows the feeling of pressure and nervousness well. It doesn’t matter if you’re ahead or behind, in the opening round or in the finals, anybody who tells you they don’t ever get nervous either isn’t human, or is full of crap.

This feeling of nervousness or anxiousness is mental, and what follows physically can destroy your confidence and technique: deceleration. Simply put, deceleration is the slowing down of your racket head speed below what you would normally swing at. This has devastating effects on your game, which I will discuss below.

Why it Happens

Mental tension often brings physical tension. If you’ve done much reading here, or listened to many of the Essential Tennis Podcasts, you know that I’m constantly advocating being as relaxed as possible so that your body can work efficiently, and you can get the best results possible out of your efforts. Well, when mentally you’re tense and nervous, it’s very difficult to keep your physical body from following suit. Once your muscles start to tense and tighten it takes more work to move them, and often times when a tennis player “gets tight” his or her swing decelerates rapidly, and the range of motion and racket path become shorter and choppy.

Why it’s Bad

Once you’ve allowed your might and muscles to get tense, and you’ve lost your racket acceleration, two big parts of what make up a quality tennis shot are taken away: power and spin. Without being relaxed, and allowing your body and racket to move and swing freely, power and spin become almost impossible. There is still a chance you could fight through and manage a decent shot, but it will only be through much greater effort than what you’re used to, often times tiring a player out much more quickly. More times than not, the result is a weak, floating shot that is easy to attack, and very difficult to keep deep in the court where your opponent will have to work to challenge you.

Even if you are able to fight through it and maintain your regular level of power and spin, the shortened range of motion makes it very difficult to be consistent and accurate. This is because the racket is facing and traveling towards your intended target for a shorter period of time, which makes the timing of your swings much more difficult.

Getting the idea here? Tightening up makes things awfully difficult!

Avoiding Deceleration

As I said earlier in this article, being mentally anxious and nervous is totally normal, it happens to low level recreational players all the way up through the top pros. The key is handling it properly.

Step one is admitting to yourself that being nervous is ok. In fact, by keeping a good attitude it’s often times pretty fun! Being nervous means that you’re playing for a purpose, and there’s something on the line, that’s pretty exciting! Stop thinking you’re the only person in the world who gets bothered and tense about competition, everybody deals with it. By realizing these things some of the pressure is taken away, and you can relax mentally and physically.

But what if the nerves stay? This is part of what makes so many of the pros so special. They deal with nerves, they get mentally tight, but the best in the world are so good at dealing with it, and even feeding off it to play even better tennis than before. The key is forcing your physical body to stay loose and relaxed, even if mental tension persists. The only way to get good at this is through practice and experience. I’m constantly suggesting to students and Podcast listeners to play your practice games and matches with something on the line so that they can get used to pressure. That’s right, I want you to bet! It doesn’t have to be anything big, 20 push ups, Gatorade, lunch, whatever. Just make sure you get yourself used to playing loose and relaxed while something is on the line, so that the feeling isn’t foreign to you when you’re in the middle of a match that you really need to win.

By putting yourself in the middle of competition with something on the line over and over, you can become more and more comfortable with being put in a pressure situation, and your body can become better at staying loose and accelerating as it should.

Take care!

Keeping Your Focus on Court

Over the past several weeks there have been several questions submitted for the podcast on mental toughness, fighting anxiety and nerves, and tightening up on certain strokes during a tennis match or even practice. The mental game is a huge part of tennis, and something that truely affects every player, so it’s obviously of huge importance to understand and work on as you continue to strive for improvement in your game.

A huge part of performing well mentaly during a tennis match or during a practice session is keeping your focus sharp, another way of saying concentration. Without good focus and concentration it’s incredibly easy to lapse into a relaxed mental state where unforced errors are more easily hit, and a players attitude can plumit into a negative state of mind.

So how can we keep better focus on the court? Below I will go over the two main ways you can control your mental focus, and improve your mental game.

Control your eyes

At the recreational level tennis players let their eyes leave the court between points way too often, and this is a huge cause of distraction. I struggled with this in college as I was a little insecure playing the bottom of my team’s line up after being “the man” in high school. I was constantly looking up into the viewing area trying to see who was watching me: My coach? Teammates? Friends from my hall or classes? Your eyes need to stay on the court, and preferably only on one of two things: the ball, or your own racket. During the points that you play your focus needs to remain as much as possible on the ball, no brainer. In between points, keeping your eyes down either on your racket, your shoes, or the court is a great way to keep your concentration. The pros are constantly fixing their strings between points, sure their strings move a lot, but this is a focus technique as well. Distractions come easily, your game will improve if you avoid them at all costs.

Control your thoughts

Firstly, it’s essential that you keep your thoughts either positive or neutral as you play your tennis. Trust me, I understand how hard this can be. I’m a perfectionist, and I’m passionate about my tennis. That means when I fail to make a shot, especially one that I feel is routine and easy, its so easy to get angry and take on a negative attitude. Negative feelings can snow ball very quickly and turn your attitude sour very quickly, this in turn can lead to poor decision making, impatience, and overall poor play. Don’t let short falls in your strokes or shot making break your focus and concentration, you need to stay sharp, and negative thoughts will destroy your mentality.

Secondly, its essential to keep your thoughts on whats happening in the present, and what needs to be done in the future. When a poor shot, point, or series of points is played, its very easy to dwell on it and forget what needs to be done to get back on track and avoid making the same mistake again. Another way that mental focus and concentration is often broken is through a poor or questionable line call by the opposition. Let it go. It’s not worth it, trust me. Dwelling on any kind of negative event during your match can do nothing but hurt you. Being able to put those kinds of things behind you quickly, and replacing those thoughts with what needs to be done NOW is a skill that will serve you well if developed.

Singles Essential: Ground Stroke Depth

While on your quest looking for single dominance there are a a myriad of different things you can focus on to try and gain the upper hand against your opponents. Ground strokes, volleys, serves, overheads, etc. Within each of those specific strokes there are many factors that will decide whether or not it will be effective, things such as speed, spin, height and angle to name a few.

In today’s game the ground stroke is becoming a very obvious necessity for anybody wanting to be successful at tennis, and in my opinion the first thing that must be mastered by anybody wanting a strong singles game is the ability to create deep, penetrating ground strokes.

Why Deep?

As you play tennis, depth of shot is going to go a long ways towards insulating yourself from attacks by your opponent. The deeper you’re able to keep your ground strokes, the farther away you keep them from your own side of the court. The farther away they stay from your side, the better of a shot it’s going to take to create an outright winner, or any other pressuring shot for that matter. Your job as a singles player is to consistently force your opponent to come up with truly great shots in order to beat you. The two main ways we DON’T want to lose are:

1. Creating so many errors you beat yourself
2. Serving up weak shot after weak shot allowing your opponent to force errors freely

By hitting deeply in the court correctly we can minimize our own mistakes by making long, relaxed, confident strings at the ball all while making it more difficult for our opponent to hit aggressive ground strokes or come in to pressure us with volleys.

How Deep?

In my private teaching, I am constantly encouraging my students to aim past the service line on their opponents side with their ground strokes. I introduce this goal immediately even to beginners after I’ve made sure they have a solid understanding of basic technique. From service line to baseline you have 18 feet of space to aim for this area. This means that aiming a forehand cross court (which is where you should be aiming a majority of the time) and past the service line gives you 243 square feet of court real estate to work with. Sound easy? It’s not. Next time you go out to practice with a partner start a cooperative rally cross court using your forehand and see how long it takes you to make five in a row in this deep box of the court. Can you do it? How about making 10 in a row as a team? If you’ve never tried this before and you’re below a 5.0 playing level you and your partner will be surprised how difficult it actually is.

Correct ball flight

There are two main factors that will make up how deeply your ground stroke will travel; speed and height. The higher and faster your shot is traveling, the farther its going to travel. What we’re trying to achieve is a shot that passes over the net by around 3 feet, and has enough drive (speed) to carry past the service line on the other side of the court. The easiest way to do this in terms of technique, is to have a long relaxed swing that travels in an upward direction as your core rotates towards your target.

The best way to practice this is either with a practice partner or with a ball machine. As I suggested earlier, pick a specific number of shots to make in a row to a certain corner past the service line as a goal, and don’t stop until you’ve reached it. When you do, take the same stroke and make that number in a row again to the opposite corner, and then go to your ground stroke on the other side of your body and accomplish the same goal to both corners again. Your target number should be at least five in a row past the service line, even if you’re a beginner. This repetitive work will help you gain confidence in your ground strokes, and help you continue to develop a strong shot using either side, and aiming for either corner.

Now get out there and practice! If you have any feedback on this article, or any questions related to it you can post them in the Blog forum of the Essential Tennis message boards!

How are your points ending?

The purpose of improvement to any part of your game is to win more points right? Well today I’d like to write to you about the types of improvements that are going to make the biggest difference in how many points, games, and matches that you win. The average recreational level player assumes the best way to win more points is to learn how to hit the ball harder, more aggressively, and with more spin. Those are all great things, and certainly will improve the quality of your tennis, however, without a solid foundation of consistency first they are almost completely irrelevant. Why? Because if you don’t know how to keep the ball in play first and foremost, trying increase how aggressive you hit the ball is going result in more errors, keeping your ratio of points won to lost the same if not worse.

So lets look quickly at the three main ways that a tennis point can end:

Winner

A shot is hit by either player that is so good, it’s not even touched by their opponent.

Forced Error

The shot missed was able to be touched, but was so difficult it wasn’t expected to be put back in play, ie, the shot that ended the point wasn’t a winner, but just too good to return.

Unforced Error

A missed shot that is the sole fault of the person who hit it, their opponent did nothing to make them hit an error.

How would you guess the majority of your points end? Unless you’re above a 5.0 level, the type of shot ending the most points will be an unforced error. That surprises a lot of tennis players who have been playing a long time and think of themselves as accomplished players. Accomplished or not, tennis is still a highly difficult sport, and errors happen much more often than is realized.

As an example I just went to the Australian Open site for this past tournament in 2008, and looked at some stats for day 7 of the 14 day event. In the men’s draw, of the 12 players who competed that day, over half of them (seven) had more unforced errors than winners or forced errors. These guys do it for a living every day, and made it half way through one of the four most contested tournaments in the world every year, and yet they made more unwarranted mistakes than either of the other two ways that points end. Granted, the players who made more errors than winners or forced errors usually lost their match, but these are still professionals we’re talking about.

I’ve charted matches for many lessons in past to show them their stats, and to analyze what needs to be worked on the most. Typically the types of numbers that I would see from a competitive club player would be two or three times the unforced errors as compared to winners. So with that being the case, how can such a player (a player like you or I) improve the number of points they win the most?

The answer is by increasing the number of shots you’re comfortable hitting in the court in a row, by increasing your mental focus and physical consistency. There is no short cut around this, the only way to increase the above skills and attributes is through solid technique, and as much practice repetition as possible with a specific target in mind.

Is having weapons and hitting the ball agressively still an important part of becoming a better player? Certainly, forcing your opponent to make mistakes is still ultimately a large part of the game, but statistically speaking, most of us are going to see the biggest results in focusing on consistency first and building our ability to put the ball in the court over and over and over. Once that has been well established, adding weapons, power, and spin on top of that are the building blocks to becoming a truly great player.

Straight arm or bent arm, Essential?

Hello and welcome to the Essential Tennis Blog!

Today’s blog topic was submitted by a listener of the Essential Tennis Podcast, and his question brings up a topic I feel strongly about. Ahmed wrote to me this week and asked:

“Hi Ian

I read this on a lot on different forums. Could you elaborate on the straight arm vs. Bent arm forehand styles. Seems Nadal and Federer play with a straight while others like Djokovich use the bent arm approach. Did you have a preference? Can you do both??”

Ahmed, to answer your questions, do I have a preference? No. Can you do both? Yes absolutely.

Tennis is much like golf and other technique intensive sports in that all of the top players do certain things the same way, and yet no two players ever look the same while executing their game. How is that possible? Well because every player has a different set of talents, skills, and athletic ability. What is good for one player might not be good for another. This is why its extremely important to be very careful who you get technical information and advice from. There are hundreds and thousands of amateur tennis players out there roving the internet looking for somebody who will listen to their ideas on how to hit a “modern” forehand, or any other stroke. Are their observations and ideas necessarily wrong? No I don’t think so. Just because the best player in the world uses a certain technique, does that mean it must be the only way it can be done? No of course not, in fact, Roger Federer does countless things that I would never recommend to most of my students. Why? Well because they aren’t Roger Federer, and we both know they never will be.

Does that mean we can’t learn anything from the pros? Certainly not, it’s always great to keep up with how the best in the world are doing things. In general though, they take good technique, and accelerate and advance it to the extreme, something that most of us don’t have the skill and ability to do. Thats why they’re on TV playing and we are not.

So, what can we take from the pros? What you should be looking for are things that every pro does without exception, and then implementing those things. Every pro uses their core muscles to power their strokes, every pro aims deep in the court on their ground strokes, every pro pronates on their serve, every pro split steps as their opponent hits the ball.

My point is, I’ve never thought about whether my arm is bent or straight on my forehand, and I would bet that Federer, Nadal, and Djokovich don’t know either if you would ask them.

Now, obviously there are extremes that should be avoided. I’m not saying that it doesn’t matter if your arm is fully stretched and extended or not at contact, or that hitting the ball half a foot from your body is good either. What you should all be focusing on, is what is comfortable and achieves the best results for YOU, when used within the basic constrains of good technique. Certain things will not work well period, like attacking from behind the baseline with a downwards swing path, or trying to hit a soft touch volley with your racket face closed. Certain things are essential to success, and certain things are style and personal preference.

So in closing, a 3.5 player shouldn’t be concerned with the small nuances of each tiny movement and angle of a professionals swing. That would be like a Ford Escort studying the telemetry of a Formula 1 race car. Rather than getting caught up in the details and debating the differences between pro’s swings, focus on the basic similarities instead, thats where we all need to improve.

Stroke review: Overhead

Welcome Essential Tennis readers! It’s great to see the community here at EssentialTennis.com start to grow, and I hope as it does more and more people can improve their tennis game.

If you’ve read many of my blog articles, or listened to many of my podcasts, you know what I’m a huge proponent of coming to the net, both in singles and doubles play. Not only does coming closer to the net give you positional advantage over your opponent, letting you see more of their site of the court allowing you to attack more directly, but you take time away from them at the same time and pressure them.

Starting to make coming to the net a part of your overall tennis strategy means that sooner or later (probably sooner) you’re going to get lobbed. This is a good thing! When your opponent puts up a lob it means they’re falling back on the, highest, slowest, and most defensive shot in tennis. When that happens, it means you’ve done your job to pressure them and they’re giving you an opportunity to put the ball away. Are all lobs going to be easy to put away? Certainly not, some opponents will have better touch than others and hitting a strong overhead on their deep lob is going to be a challenge.

So how do you hit an overhead correctly? I’ll break down the basics into three main parts below.

1. The turn

When that lob goes up into the air you only have a limited amount of time to take advantage of it by getting into a good position to hit an aggressive overhead. The very first thing we must do is turn our body and hitting arm so that both the feet and shoulders are perpendicular to the net with the racket back in an “answer the phone” position. This does two things. Firstly it gets your body in a position to move back in balance, rather than back pedaling with your chest facing the net. Secondly it rotates your core and shoulders so that when we do get into a good position the whole body can be used to rotate back forwards again into contact. Both these things are essential to hitting a solid overhead, the ability to move and position, and the ability to rotate and hit a strong shot.

2. Positioning

After you’ve rotated to the side and taken the racket back you must immediately start making movements to get underneath the ball. The best overhead swing technique in the world does nothing for you if you’re not in position to actually use it, so footwork is huge. I often have students point up towards the ball with their opposite arm as they rotate to the side. This does two things: makes sure that a good rotation was achieved, and it also is a great aid in tracking the ball and moving to the right spot. If your position under the ball makes it possible for you to reach up with your opposite hand and actually catch the ball then rotating your dominant side forwards and up towards that spot in the air should make contact quite easy and comfortable. So have a partner hit some lobs in the air and practice rotating to the side and catching them with your non dominant hand, not making an actual swing at the ball. After completing this several times in a row position yourself in the same way, but this time rotate forwards and reach up with the racket to make contact.

3. Contact

Contact should be made with a full extension of both arm and shoulder, with your racket face square to the ball. At contact your body should be back to parallel to the net having made a 90 degree turn into contact, using that strength in your core and shoulders. Hopefully your positioning was good, and you can make this swing at the ball while in balance, being able to make an aggressive swing at the ball. If your overhead hits the net, make sure that you’re making an upwards swing towards the ball. Only if you’re very close to the net can you actually swing downwards and actually spike the ball. If you’re at the service line or behind you’ll have to make an upward swing to clear the ball over the top of the net. If the ball sails long, then your racket face was open (tilted upwards) at contact. Its very important your face is square to the ball at contact or else hitting the ball aggressively isn’t possible without missing long.

I know I just went over a lot of technique things, and they could all be described in greater detail. I wanted to simply go over the most important points of hitting a solid overhead. Other important technique things include the grip that you use and the racket face when you take your racket and dominant shoulder back initially. I will go over these in the future.

As always, thanks very much for stopping by and spending time at Essential Tennis. If you ever have any questions or comments feel free to let me know. I look forward to continuing to help everybody improve their tennis!

-Ian