Mark is a 4.0 player who drove up from Chicago because he wanted to fix a gaping hole in his game: a complete inability to volley. It’s not that Mark refused to approach the net; it’s just that anytime he did it was a total crap shoot, because he couldn’t consistently send the ball where he wanted to.
The first thing I noticed when Mark volleyed was that he no “feel,” or touch. Feel sounds like one of those magical tennis talents that you’re either gifted with at birth or not, but it’s actually nothing like that. “Feel” just means an ability to absorb the power of the incoming ball instead of inducing power on it. It’s a skill that can be learned with practice.
Whenever I teach net play, I begin with what I call the Do Nothing Volley Drill. Using this and other step by step progressions, Mark and I were able to strip away all of his tension, tightness and over-hitting so he could finally feel the ball on the strings. Once he could do this, Mark could then begin directing the ball to specific spots on the court. Slowly but surely, we built his volley technique from the ground up as Mark learned to apply spin and create depth, making his volley a competitive shot while maintaining precision and accuracy.
