Category Archives: Tennis

Overhead Tennis Smash

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If you’ve got the confidence and control to get it right, your opponent is unlikely to be able to return your smash, and you’ll almost certainly win the point.

Up and over

The overhead smash can be hit from both forehand and backhand sides. You’ll get the power of your entire body behind it, slamming the ball deep into the dusty corners of your opponent’s court. An overhead smash is often used in response to a lob shot.

- Stand sideways on to the court. Your feet should be apart and your knees slightly bent. Bend your elbow as you start to take your racket up. Point to the ball with your other hand as you get into position.

- Use the same “throwing” motion that you use when you serve. Take your racket back behind your shoulder, keeping your elbow up high. Push up with your back leg and turn your shoulders into the shot.

- Aim to hit the ball when it’s in front of your body and when your arm is fully extended. Flick your wrist forward and down as you make contact. This will aim the ball in the direction you want it to go.

- Bring your racket head down through the ball. Turn your body back toward your opponent and adjust your feet to help you keep your balance. Bring your racket foot forward to stop the forward momentum of your body.

Quick thinking

As soon as you spot a lob coming your way, think fast, and move even faster. Can you let the ball bounce first, which will make your shot easier? Or is the ball at the right level for an airborne shot? Either way, makeup your mind and move. Sidestep so you keep your balance. You want the ball to be above and in front of your body.

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Tennis Backhand Volley

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You can prepare for a backhand volley in a flash, giving you a rapid-fire return that can knock the socks off your opponent. Just remember to keep your racket in front, move into the ball, and punch it like you mean it.

Threat at the net

The backhand volley is played before the ball bounces, between 3 and 7 feet (1 and 2 meters) from the net; if you are any farther back, it’s harder to put one past your opponent. It takes confidence to volley because net play is all action, all the time.

Backhand

Start out with a two-handed backhand volley. After playing a while, try changing your volley to a one-handed grip. This is a tough shot to master in the beginning. Keep at it!

- As the ball approaches on your backhand side, take your racket back slightly as your upper body turns. Your weight should be on your toes. Step into the ball to meet it and release the racket from your supporting hand.

- Make contact with the ball in front of your body. Push the racket forward with a short, sharp punch. Keep the racket head above your wrist. Use your free arm to help you balance, and recover quickly.

- Keep your follow-through short and sweet. Drive the racket through the point of contact. Almost as soon as the ball leaves the strings, hold your racket still for a moment. You could face a fast return, and you’ll need to get ready.

Way up high

The High backhand volley is a tough shot. When you see a high ball on its way, position yourself so you will be behind it when you strike. Aim to hit the ball deep, but if you have to, just block it back to your opponent.

Way down low

Low backhand volleys are tricky. It’s not easy to get the ball up and over the net and still keep it in court. When you spot a low ball, get down to meet it. Turn your upper body sideways as you take the racket back, and crouch down with your weight on the foot. Step forward to meet the ball, and punch under and up through the ball. Tilt the racket face a little to give the ball enough lift to sail over the net.

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Back To The Basics – Tennis Skills That Are A Must When In The Game

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No matter what level your game is at right now, you can play better tennis by focusing on a few fundamental skills. Every player can pull their game up and sharpen their strokes by putting these skills into play. If you’re dedicated to being the best you can be, here’s how to raise the level of your game.

Agility

To reach across the whole court for the ball, you’re going to have to run. To hit a low volley, you’re going to have to get down to the ball. To hit a smash, you’re going to have to leap as high as you can. All these shots, and most others, require agility (quick and easy movement). Doing special exercises will help to improve your agility.

Reaction times

In today’s game, especially on a fast surface like grass, it’s essential to be able to react instantly to whatever your opponent throws at you. Reaction times will improve with training exercises and match practice. Your actions should become automatic-so you don’t have to even think about them. Mental alertness and concentration are vital.

Hand-eye coordination

Being able to hit the ball with your racket-which involves judging distance, speed, and height–depends on hand-eye coordination. This will improve the more you play the sport, but it is worth doing throwing- and-catching exercises to develop this vital skill.

Balance

If you lose your balance, it’s much more likely you will make an error and lose the point. Keep control of your body at all times and avoid uneven, jerky movements. Stay low when you move. Get into the habit of standing with your feet wide apart to stabilize your balance. Above all, keep your head still. You’ll be able to see exactly what’s going on.

Ready Position

Make taking this position a habit after each shot and before the next one. Bend your knees slightly, feet shoulder-width apart and toes ready to push you off in any direction. Hold the racket up in a central position, so that you can take it back to either side. Keep your head up.

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Master Your Emotions

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“The fifth set is not about tennis, its about nerves.”
- Boris Becker

Any unpleasant thoughts you have come with an unpleasant feeling. You may have a high degree of confidence with your forehand but a low degree of confidence with your backhand. If you want to win the game going on inside your head, you have to deal with your emotions. I’m going to guide you to be your most confident self and feel resourceful in just a moment, for any endeavour you choose.

You will encounter a broad range of emotions naturally during a tennis match which may predict the performance you are going to have. By being aware and monitoring your emotions you can become aware of your optimal performance state.

You may be wondering what is an emotion? An emotion is the mood you are in at any particular moment and is individual and unique to all of us. Love, hate, confidence, fear, they are all emotions and we constantly go in and out of them all day long. All behaviour is the result of an emotion.

Remember times when you were filled with confidence, determination, joy, optimism? Alas, you also suffered anger, resentment and remorse. Emotions are your subconscious minds way of telling you there is something going on you should pay attention to.

Its useful to take a brief look at emotions for you to gain some insight. A primary emotion occurs closely to the event that brings it on, so it is the emotion we feel first. A secondary emotion appears after the primary emotion. So you could feel joy as a primary emotion which will then lead to bliss, delight, pride or optimism.

Sometimes the problem with primary emotions is that they disappear as fast as they arrive, to be replaced by the secondary emotion, which can then complicate matters as the secondary emotion may come from a more complex chain of thinking, so it becomes difficult to really know what is going on, as in the case of anger arriving out of fear.

Here you will learn to programme yourself to experience more of the resourceful emotions you want in all the situations you want. The pictures you make in your imagination and the way you talk to yourself are known as internal representations. And that is all they are, representations, not real life, so they cannot harm you.

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Pressure in Tennis

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“When you have fun, it changes all the pressure into pleasure.”

- Ken Griffeyn

Pressure gets a bad name. It’s the ultimate lie detector. When its present, getting near to match point for example, it can be a positive force bringing out the best in you, or a negative one, being an excuse to quit. Some players will break through, while those less committed break down. Everyone feels pressure in competition, no one is immune. The court can seem like a playground or feel like a prison ground.

It can often start before the game begins. Players under pressure become internally self-conscious rather then externally task-conscious. Worrying about miss-hit balls will usually cause you one.

Recall a time when you felt pressure. Remember what you were doing, feeling, saying. Where you excited or nervous? Did you expect failure or feel a desire to win? Did you let all kinds of negative thoughts come into your mind which may have been influenced by personality or environment factors?

Excessive mental pressure often produces mental blocks. Then anything recently learnt in training, be it tactical or technical may well be forgotten. Some situations can be embarrassing or humiliating, especially in front of spectators, creating a further negative performance experience. These experiences may lodge themselves in the mind and body showing up as performance problems either right away, or lying dormant for days, weeks, months before raising their ugly heads.

Demands on pro tennis players is higher than ever before. Sponsorship, TV exposure, fans, money, they all increase pressure. Become mentally tough, look at pressure as a challenge to drive yourself that much harder.

Pressure and stress creates muscle tension, causing over-tightness, generally in the neck and shoulders. The heart rate goes up, breathing quickens, skin perspires. Some feel their stomach churn. These are all physical early warning signs. Mentally your mind starts racing and negative thoughts float into your mind.

When you’re tense, you want to get your task over with as soon as possible. The more you hurry, the worse you will probably play, having the ball land short, or sail to the back fence, this creates even more pressure in your mind and greater muscle tension, so wasting more energy. Consider this. Stress is strictly internal, it does not exist outside of your mind. Match conditions do not become anxious, only players do.

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