Please Help My Forehand!?!?

If you swing your forehand properly up to the last dot, you can implement a forearm pronation to supply yourself with some extra spin. What pros actually use is a stretch-shortening cycle to get the sort of spin rates they hit -- basically, they twist their arm the opposite way to which they want the movement to go and hyper-stretch it when they swing forward so that they can benefit from a little extra juice when they will release everything and turn it the other way around. In more technical turn, they attack the ball with a closed face, the wrist extended with a slight or pronounced ulnar deviation and a certain degree of supination. As they get close enough to the ball, they get their hand to pronate. They also bother to always keeping their racket face slightly closed and, when trying to hit maximum spin, they aim to make contact on the lower part of the string bed (the lower part being actually the side which is nearest to the ground when the racket is parallel to it).

But, I'll tell you upfront: if you don't nail down every other small detail which makes a forehand good (it means you need a top notch standard technique), you won't be able to achieve anything by adding this -- in fact, it won't even work out properly. It needs to be the cherry on the top, something you add: it literally happens as you swing and because you swing in a certain way, which is why you need the appropriate swing first. And, if you were wondering, yes amateurs even without coaches can get to do it; they just need to work hard and find out how to teach themselves how to build such a shot.

I do it myself and I can get that extreme dipping effect you see on the tour; I can get to have my forehand land a feet away from the service line and yet bounce high enough to still push you behind the baseline; I can also use it to attack... The point is that it can be achieved, that it works, but I also worked on doing forehands relentlessly. I begun being able to hit that much spin mid-summer last year and it took me 3,5 times 6 months of play (I play from April to October) to achieve that. And, they weren't months rallying with people; they were mostly months and months of getting to a court and tossing ball up to get different bouncing heights and learn to swing at them. Sometimes, 30 or even 40 hours per week... plus watching videos and exchanging on blogs and forums, researching and thinking about my form. I could hit hundreds and hundreds of forehands each week.

Now, I have a very clean form and a pretty powerful stroke, but it was hard to get there. So, if you want to add this extra juice on your forehands and stop having to worry about over-hitting, be certain that you mastered the basics. Tennis is a wonderful sport where almost anyone can do something special with it, but it's also a profoundly technical sport: you need to bother about good form, even if it means loosing to pushers at first; you need to work hard to get into good position on each ball -- there's no secret: if pros look so good it's that they are masters at making their lives easier, so emulate them and move those damn feet --; you need to learn specific series of steps and own those footwork patterns so that you can still strike the ball with ease and power despite being on the move; etc.

Finally, as for your recent problems, the answer usually falls as this: you picked up bad hitting habits because of your poor/lazy footwork. Make your damn life easy and be rigorous on the court. The first objective is to try to always be hitting all balls while having your trunk straight up; if you bend down or sideways, you're hitting a shot you never practiced, so it will be harder. The second one is to never be wrong-footed: split step when your opponent hits; it will give you a chance to move in all directions and, as a secondary effect, it stretches your quads once you land which means you're ready to start right off -- if you split step, you essentially prepare yourself to run before you know where the ball will go or even before it leaves your opponent's racket, so it's a huge advantage you can give yourself. The last objective behind trying to get solid footwork is to be able to give yourself a chance to use your legs and hips regardless of where or how you will be hitting -- if you do it, you will be hitting with the help of more parts of your body which means you will tend to produce better balls and that will make staying in comfortable position a lot easier.

As I tell you, I'd say that virtually all "bad days" are periods wherein you lack focus or are mentally distracted which affects your footwork. If you look at your feet and get them well set, you will miraculously start to hit well again; even bad players can hit a ball once they are in position, so bother doing it too!

A good way to add spin without decreasing the speed is to use a windshield wiper motion. I used to have a problem with hitting the ball too flat but my dad who is a professional teaching pro taught me to extend my arm and use your wrist to generate spin. This method is what Roger Federer uses also. I'm 17 and have been playing tennis since 7th grade. I've played varsity tennis since 7th grade as well. This is hard to explain through text but just try using your wrist more and try to use a windshield wiper motion. Remember though, this is a lot easier said than done. Your wrist and forearm strength also determine how much spin you generate. Another thing you could do is put a different string in your racquet. One that grips the ball a lot better so you can generate more spin. I hope this answer helps somewhat. It's a tough question to answer through text and a lot easier to just demonstrate.

good add spin decreasing speed windshield wiper motion problem hitting ball flat dad professional teaching pro taught extend arm wrist generate spin method roger federer 17 playing tennis 7th grade ve played varsity tennis 7th grade hard explain text wrist windshield wiper motion remember lot easier wrist forearm strength determine spin generate put string racquet grips ball lot generate spin hope answer helps tough question answer text lot easier demonstrate