Give Yourself a Heart-Attack for Better Serves

OK, no, not really! This would be a terrible idea and you are advised against it. However, on a tennis-note, have you ever wondered why your serves always break down in a match but you're virtual maestro in practice? Well, let's think about it for a second...when do you practice your serves? In the middle of the workout? At the beginning? The end? Do you sprinkle serves throughout your practice? Of course not. If you're like the majority of players taking lessons, you will spend 52.5 minutes working on your ground-strokes and then finish your workout with a couple of minutes of serves. Even if you are extremely motivated and practice serves for 20-30 minutes at a time, you could still use some tweaking in your method in order to get the most out of your serves in a match.

Here's the deal: when you play points, you are likely to move... sometimes a lot. The movement takes a physical toll on your body. You will breathe harder and maybe even break a sweat. To keep up with a higher demand of your muscles and lungs, your heart will start beating more vigorously in order to supply more oxygenated blood and glucose (i.e. energy) to your cells (at least, this is what we remember from that one day we stayed awake during high-school Biology class). To summarize, when you're actually playing points your heart works hard(er).

Conversely, when you're working on your serves in practice, you are doing it at a relatively resting heart rate. You hit a serve... you walk back to baseline... you think about your motion... you bounce the ball... wait for an airplane to pass; etc. If you were getting ready for serving at a County Fair, this is the type of exercise that you would require. However, when you're playing a match, your opponent has something to say about the state of your cardiovascular system when you're executing the motion. Your opponent doesn't toss the ball for you or tell you where to hit the serve but if he's made you play a long, hard point beforehand, he will have a say regarding the quality of your serve... unless, of course, you practice hitting serves with a slightly elevated heart rate thereby training your system to respond better to stressful situations.

With this in mind, if you are committed to improving your serve under pressure, try this next time you work on your serves: incorporate some form of physical exercise between serves. For example, hit a serve and do 5 burpees; hit a serve and do 5 kangaroo jumps; hit two serves and then shadow-swing 8 side-to-sides; hit a serve a sprint to the service line and back; etc. The key is to train yourself to hit serves when you're tired; when you're winded; when your brain lacks sufficient oxygen to make smart decisions. By giving yourself these mini heart-attacks, you will be a lot more prepared for dealing with serving at a key point while your heart is pounding out of your chest. This skill is particularly important when the rest time between points is not sufficient to bring your heart rate back down to normal levels - which tends to happen quite often the higher level you play.

Steal This Drill: One Person Serve and Volleying

It is said that serve and volleying is dead. If you listen to the experts - be it tennis commentators, former players or your local pro - it seems that the only thing more irrelevant in today's game than serve and volleying are wooden rackets and cat-gut strings :)

We'll be the first to concede that with the advent of more modern equipment - lighter, more powerful rackets; polyester strings; springier balls - the server's advantage might be somewhat more diminished or neutralized. However, there's no better way to throw a monkey wrench into your opponent's plans than by serve-and-volleying every few points if only to keep her honest. A well executed play will force your opponent to aim lower over the net than if you are staying back after the serve. Sometimes, you might draw a mistake (easy point) just by "looking the part" of someone who knows what he's doing. Other times, the return my come right on your string bed. Of course, chances are that a good returner may dip the ball on you so it's good to work on pick-ups as well. 

However, we believe that it's not the serve-and-volley strategy that is dead; but the art of practicing for it. For example, nowadays, every junior has his/her own private coach who may get a bit antsy having to return the player's serve and forcing him to serve and volley. In addition, since juniors try to protect their emotions, very seldom do they play practice matches against other kids their age. Therefore, they hardly ever have the opportunity to work on new things such as serve and volleys. So how are they expected to implement it in a match?! 

If you're self-motivated and interested in learning this dimension, don't despair; there IS a way. Next time you practice your serves, rather than putting the bucket of balls behind you, set it at the service line. Pick up ONE ball, serve and SPRINT in for the bucket. When reaching the bucket (or ball pyramid), bend your knees and pick up another ball (just one). Careful that you don't overrun the bucket. Move in fast but with controlled steps. Rinse and repeat.

A major element of the serve and volley play is the movement from 1 foot inside the baseline to the service line. A lot of players practice their serves (let's say that they are dedicated enough to do that) and practice their volleys but fail to tie the two concepts together. So when they try the serve-and-volley play for the first time in a match they look like a fish out of water because the movement is not natural. By doing this drill - whether on your own or with multiple players on court - you will learn how to follow the ball in and measure your steps before reaching the basket. Furthermore, this is a wonderful way for breaking out of the usual serving routine and throwing some light sprints into the mix thereby keeping your leg muscles engaged and working. In addition, by moving forward, you will become more adept at using your body's momentum for hitting the ball (as opposed to hitting static serves). 

Serve and volley is not dead but the artistry of the game may use some resuscitation. 

Fun Backboard Training: Overhead Smashes

Becoming a great tennis player can be a lonely endeavour, often times with nobody to practice with. One way to spice up your serving/overhead practice is to utilize the wall (check out the diagram above). Start with gently tapping your smashes against the wall, then graduate to further distances away from the wall.

One tip to keep in mind is to hold the racquet extremely loose. Hit the ball gently, with feel. See if you can hit smash after smash without having to move too much from your original position. Can you control the ball. Rookie players will grip the racquet too tight and just "gun" the overhead with no sense of feel or direction. The best players do not take full cuts at the overheads (sure they can if they want to), but they understand the aspect of placement. This type of hitting against the wall simulates your warmup or match overheads, trying to hit it down into the court (as if you were aiming for inside the service line).

Shorter Players Can Have Great Serves

If you are a shorter player, chances are you have been told over the course of your lifetime that you need to give up the idea of having a big serve and settle for getting a high first serve percentage. There is nothing wrong with this line of thinking if you have maxed out all your options (practiced for hours and hours) coupled with intense hunger (relentless energy and willingness to learn), which means you have given it your best effort and your best option is to just start the point with a safe slice serve.

However, if you are hungry enough, young enough (adults, it's never too late!), and lucky enough to have a equally motivated coach who knows what they are talking about (proof is in the pudding, they have a great serve themselves) - shorter players can have great serves. To be honest, the serve is not as complicated as people (usually teaching professionals) make it out to be. Here are some simple tips:

1) Continental grip
2) From beginning to end of stroke, your grip on the handle should be a 1 or 2 out of 5, 5 being tight (Kind of like holding a bird in your hand, don't want to kill it nor do you want it to fly away)
3) Swing as fast as you can (a loose arm and wrist will creat a wrist-snap) 
4) Do not move your feet (simpler-the-better to start, less moving parts that could breakdown)

Without fast racquet headspeed, your serve will never be great. It's as simple as that. The serve is a trust shot, full commitment. Once you get the racquet headspeed, then developing a legit serve can happen. With the racquets of today, shorter players can have monster serves, monster kicks, and monster sliding serves.

Here are some creative ways to improving your pop on the serve: 

1. In the first drill, try to stay close the back fence on one side of the court ("S" for "server" get it?) and aim at first directly into the opposite back fence. Try to hit 10 in a row without any arc whatsoever...that is, straight as a bullet; fence to fence. After you hit ten, aim the next set inside of the opposite baseline (#2). Thereafter, 10 inside of the service line. Again, try to focus on power, not on hitting (reaching your target) with arc. The purpose of this drill is to isloate the fast-twitch muscles in your shoulder and core. 

2. In the second drill, start out at the fence again and hit ten serves inside the service box. After your first set, move in 2 feet and hit another ten. Then move in 2 feet again. Work on hitting "up and through" the ball. As you get closer, that power that you're developing will be channeled into a proper technique.

3. The "machine gun" drill is also a good way to loosen up and isolate the shoulders, arm and core. Grab 4 or 5 balls in your left hand and serve those balls (from service line) in rapid succession: toss and hit; toss and hit. Hence, the name of the drill. Feet should remain firmly planted on the ground. 

4. Reader "tweener" has suggested that to work on pronation, the server should practice serving from the knees. This is also a good way to isolate the shoulders and work on developing the forearm strength. Thank you, tweener, for your advice. This is the type of input that we're looking for on this site. 

5. Lastly, it's important to recall our previous tip regarding power. If you want to improve your serve speed, you must practice hitting fast serves. If you want to run a fast sprint, don't train for a marathon. Speed of the arm and power generated by the body need to be integrated into the motion. Assuming that your serve components are there, start cranking the serve. Since serving "hard" is draining, appropriate rest should be taken until your body builds a tolerance to this type of workout. Bear in mind that a lot of players' career have been stunted by the mentality that "I'm short and therefore I'll never be a good server". This is like saying "I'm tall and therefore I don't need to practice my serve". What's one thing have to do with another?! Sure, certain players might not hit 150mph. But it may be possible for them to hit 120s or 130s. However, they're never going to get there if they settle for 90s in practice. Boundaries of your physical abilities must be continually pushed - little by little.  

If you have the tennis bug and you are willing to put in the work, don't settle for a serve that is slower than falling snow. The time will be well spent and I've never heard of anyone who doesn't like to win.

Steal This Drill: Serving With a Purpose

The purpose of this drill is to practice connecting the serve with the next shot in order to combine a deadly 1-2 punch combination. Often times, players will practice their ground strokes, then practice their serves (usually at the end of practice) and, perhaps, play a couple of points at the end. This is the only times when they have the opportunity to combine the two and figure out what they want or need to do with the shot that comes back after the serve. And, unless you're name is John Isner, the serve will usually come back. Therefore, it is important to master a combination play and take the guessing work out of the situation.

In other words, IF the serve comes back, you know exactly WHERE you place the next ball and HOW you can go about doing it. In the figures above, the blue line represents the path of the serve; the yellow lines represent the path of the returns; and the red represent the path of the server's follow-up shot.

First, set up the service box by dividing it into two halves. Tell your partner the half of the box into which you will be serving; s/he will then return it either down-the-line or cross court (agree in advance; maybe 5 minutes on each side). The server takes the return and redirects it again towards a target to the opposite side of the court (i.e., away from the returner). The players can either do a set number of serve/returns or stay in a particular role for a set number of minutes and then switch roles. This way, both players get to serve/open up the court and return. This is a drill that can be done with/without a coach so there's no excuse for not doing it. Thus, when your coaches tell you that you need to "work on serves and/or returns", please feel free to "steal this drill" and accomplish your mission. By repeating this drill a few days a week, you will become more confident at knowing how to react to a returned serve (fast feet; low center of gravity; quick back-swing; explosive follow-through) which will take more pressure off your serves to begin with (because you won't have to rely on an Ace or service winner to win the point). In addition, this is another great way for the players to get focused and repetitive practice for their returns.