2009 May — Brent Abel's WebTennis

Spacing – The Final Frontier – Finding Your Ideal Contact Point

May 7, 2009 By Brent 1 Comment

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Space – I guess Captain Kirk and the crew knew the true answer to your tennis success!

There are several fundamentals, mechanics, elements, call them whatever, that are common to all tennis strokes.

But there is one specific fundamental, and if it doesn’t happen, all of the other fundmanetals can be thrown out the door.

You can have the perfect grip for that stroke, the perfect shoulder turn out of your ready position to commit to either your forehand or backhand, the perfect balance posture, the perfect swing shape, the perfect everything, but if you have not created the necessary space away from the path of the incoming ball, all of that other prefection can’t happen…

I see so many players consumed with only their swing mechanics. They worked endlessly on perfecting a specific swing shape, contact point, finish position, etc., etc., and rarely if ever practice and master the footwork needed

for the necessary spacing away from the path of the incoming ball which will enable them to use their swing.

Look, the swing is really the easiest part of what comprises hitting a tennis ball.

The footwork, creating space away from the path of the ball by moving your feet, is the toughest thing to do because we hardly ever practice this stuff with some real intention.

Our brain gets so locked into thinking about swing mechanics that lots of times slow incoming balls eventually just eat us up.

We never get out of the path of that incoming ball and then we have to improvise our stroke mechanics.

That’s a tough way to play and be consistent with your shot making.

Want to be consistent on the court, meaning, want to really cut down on your unforced errors?

Of course you do. If you can consistently create the ideal space away from the path of the incoming ball, your swing mechanics will finally have a chance to become repeatable.

The last thing you want to do out there is force yourself into having lots and lots of different types of forehands for example.

When I recently played the finals of the National 60 Hardcourts last month in Palm Springs, I’ll admit that I was good and nervous right before the match.

And I knew that if I could concentrate on just one thing, my nerves would eventually dissipate.

So, in the match warm up, I simply focused on moving my feet so my spacing was perfect for each shot.

I didn’t think about shot direction, height, speed, anything else but just creating the necessary space I wanted with my feet.

I knew that my instincts would tell me where and how to play each shot IF, and only if, I had created the proper spacing away from the path of the incoming ball in the warmup.

I wanted to make hitting the ball as simple as possible.

Once the match started, I was in the right mindset to not worry about potential shot outcome, results, and I knew all I had to do was react to my opponent’s shots with my feet and then trust that everything else would just work out.

I’m getting a bit off the point here, but the reality is this, if you haven’t created the proper spacing to the incoming ball with your feet, it’ll be an improv session and probably not very funny…

Try this the next time you’re out on the court.

For example, with your forehand groundstroke, figure out what is the ideal distance away from the ball at contact that you want.

Your contact point on your forehand might be ahir different than mine, a hair different from someone else. Doesn’t matter…

What does matter is that you first of all identify what is your ideal distance away from the ball when you make contact on your forehand.

What’s the distance, what’s the position to your side, out in front, etc.

Once you know that distance, then practice creating the space you need with your feet so you can always give yourself the opportunity to play your forehands with that ideal distance away from your body at contact.

The more consistent you are with your spacing, the more consistent a shot maker you’ll become.

Brent

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How To Turn Your Unforcing Shots Into Your Opponent's Forced Errors

May 4, 2009 By Brent 1 Comment

— PACIFIC COAST SENIORS TOURNAMENT UPDATE —

Well, it certainly wasn’t a beauty contest out there the past several days at the 2009 Pacific Coast Seniors tournament (National Category 2) at the Berkeley Tennis Club, Berkeley, CA.

Lots of rain, lots of interrupted matches, lots of sitting around for days, the doubles events eventually got cancelled, etc., …

And then came the referee’s decision to make all the singles matches use the No-Ad scoring system with a 10 point Super Tie-Breaker for any matches that went into a 3rd set.

Talk about tense… It really unsettled me. And even though I eventually won the 60s singles, I never really felt comfortable with the No-Ad scoring system knowing that at any moment if I played a couple of loose point s I could be in a world of hurt.

No-Ad is such a different mindset. The perception is that every point becomes so important that it’s really, really easy to go into a much slower and less free swing mode with your strokes in hopes that you don’t miss.

It wasn’t necessarily a sense of pushing, but swing freedom wasn’t happening all that much.

But what finally worked for me was the realization that my opponent was feeling the same thing and that I simply had to stay true to moving forward, getting up to net, and make him play passing shot after passing shot.

It worked. That combination of putting that pressure on your opponent where they know they can’t miss AND they now have to hit a perfect passing shot can result in a lot of unforced errors (missed passing shot attempts).

And let’s add one more element of pressure on your opponent for upcoming points.

If you have shown that you can frequently approach the net and force a passing shot attempt, guess what, for future points your opponent is going to make sure they don’t play shots to

you where you can approach.

Their attempts to keep the ball away from you, even just trying keep their shots deep to keep you back on your baseline, can lead to more unforced errors from them.

There’s lots of residual benefits in future points from playing approach shots now.

And really, let’s define an unforced error in this situation.

Usually we define an unforced error where your opponent plays a shot to you where you have the ability to get set up within a reasonable amount of time to where you should be able to play a simple high percentage shot back to your opponent.

And yet, we find a way to miss that shot. That’s a classic unforced error, almost like a gift to your opponent.

So what if you add one more dimension to that situation.

You play a simple approach shot that doesn’t “force” your opponent to run, isn’t a particualrly deep shot that requires your opponent to have to perfectly time “picking up” your shot right after the bounce, but almost just sits there waiting for him/her to execute their forehand or backhand groundstroke.

But the added element is that you’re now up at net, inside the service line, basically saying, “here I am, pass me, AGAIN…”.

And that added element of your court position can create lots of “forced” errors despite the fact that your approach shot wasn’t what anyone might define as a really great forcing type of shot.

If you play that shot as an approach shot, and actually come into the net area, then you’re forcing your opponent into a possible error simply because of where you are on the court.

You can apply lots of perceived pressure onto your opponent with where you are on the court as they have to play their shot.

Practice your approach shots, practice your volleys, practice your overheads, and practice thinking that if you do get passed from time to time that you haven’t failed.

This is a pure numbers game. The more pressure you apply with court positioning, the less you’ll get passed.

So if you approach a couple of times, get passed, think that you’ve failed, and then stop coming in to net, then you’re right, you have failed.

Lots of players fear getting passed. I don’t. I believe that my opponent realistically in any given match has only so many clean passing shot winners available to them on that day.

Everyone has a finite number of passing shot winners in their bag for any match.

My job (your job too) is to empty their bag as soon as possible…

I’ve got two new lessons being videotaped this week that will help

you with your ability to approach the net and take charge of that point and the match.

Approach shots and drop shots…

If you can add a drop volley to your selection oif available shots when you’re up at net, you’ll be armed and dangerous!

Look for those new lessons by the end of this week or the start of next week.

In the meantime, if you haven’t already done so, claim your copy of my detailed lessons on the forehand & backhand volleys, the overhead, and the forehand & backhand half volleys.

- Forehand & Backhand Volleys – Click here

- Overhead – Click here

- Forehand & Backhand Half Volleys (Comes with a bonus lesson – The Return of Serve) - Click Here

Claim all 3 lessons and get a 30% discount - Click here

Brent

Filed Under: Tennis Tip - Approach Shots, Tennis Tip - Drop Shot, Tennis Tip - Half Volley, Tennis Tip - Volleys

How To Turn Your Unforcing Shots Into Your Opponent’s Forced Errors